


different body (same soul)

by tamedbanshee



Series: search through reflections for my outline [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Clan Politics, Gen, I can't even explain it, Inferiority Complex, Nohara Rin Lives, Reincarnation, Self-Esteem Issues, Team as Family, basically rin's v bitter and remembers more than she should, konoha isn't perfect, nohara rin deserved better, rin is a smol angry child, slow divergence from canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-09-24 08:03:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17096927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tamedbanshee/pseuds/tamedbanshee
Summary: She didn't ask for this. It wasn't her job to be consumed and invaded and spat out so that these boys would evolve.(Or Rin's forced to grow up a lot quicker than her classmates and she's never going to forgive them for it.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Aka me getting super mad about Rin basically being used as the catalyst for Kakashi and Obito's storylines.

For the most part, Rin was a normal girl.

She wasn’t particularly fond of bugs, _hated_ ginger-heavy foods, her favourite colour was dark green and no doubt, there was probably a long list of facts she could give that would consolidate the fact that she was, for all intents and purposes, a normal girl born in Konoha.

For the most part, she was normal.

It was the other part which people tended to brush over, to ignore. Herself included.

It wasn’t something that happened overnight, it was small, almost unnoticeable until it almost bowled her over in the streets that it wasn’t normal.

People weren’t led around by their feelings, _sure they were_ but not in the same way which Rin was. It was like a solid worth in her chest, a weigh on her breastbone which seemed to direct her. It pulled and pushed her in certain directions, sometimes _it screamed_. Mostly, it was a hum in the back of her head, like white noise, acknowledging everything whilst doing nothing.

Sometimes it was a sign, the echo might croon in satisfaction about one particular spot, a random little patch of grass in a training field that seemed to be long forgotten. It was just a flicker but the next time which Rin returned, someone had dropped their wallet, filled with enough money for her not to have to worry for a week or three.

So maybe she started to pay more attention to what the echo was telling her.

It took a few months to realize that it was happening, but it only took a few seconds to realize that it wasn’t normal.

She kept quiet about it, curled in on herself.

No one noticed when little orphan Nohara Rin turned quiet, no one noticed or cared. The only thing she had going for her was the strange echoes which dragged her around like a rag doll. It was something she vowed to get under control, to keep under wraps, to hide away from the prying eyes of civilians, the matron of the orphanage, _everyone_.

Rin was, after all, supposed to be just a normal girl.

* * *

 There was a stigma which came with being an orphan in Konoha, and at first, Rin didn’t notice.

( _The echo laughed because Rin didn’t notice a lot_.)

That’s fine because she was getting better at least.

The majority treated her in a similar way to the other orphans, with the same sort of feigned politness and ill-masked disdain. This included the staff in the orphanage itself, all the children were treated that way and why wouldn’t they?

In the eyes of the village, they were burdens.

Some were adopted, _the number was depressingly small_ , a select few would be drafted to join the Academy each year and then the others would be left to rot in the sense of loneliness until they were of age.

That was when they were kicked out and almost never seen again.

Whenever Rin was out and about though, a bit of distance between herself and the orphanage, there was suddenly these assumptions weighing down on her shoulders. It was like a brand she couldn’t shake because expectant eyes followed her because they assumed that since she didn’t have parents, she’d be unruly and unkempt and undisciplined.

They thought immediately, _“This girl is going to be a problem child.”_

This was mainly the civilians line of thought but, still, the civilians made up two-thirds of Konoha’s population.

“I’m watching you brat!” The vendor called out to her.

Rin rolled her eyes, tossing the tomatoes between her hands, squeezing gently to test its ripeness. The vendor was fat and balding, the only threat he posed to her was that he could still swing a broom at her. He was the target of many thieves and pickpockets, so she didn’t take it personally when he eyed her with suspicion.

She had a small amount of allowance which was granted by the Hokage, all of the orphans did. Enough to give herself a treat every now and then.

“How much for these?” She asked quietly, lugging the small basket of fruit and vegetables towards the vendor.

He inspected it thoroughly but not without giving her the stink-eye. “It’s 150 ryō.”

Say what you want, but he was fair in his prices.

“Here you go,” Rin handed over the money and gathered her goods quickly.”Have a nice day, sir.”

The vendor waved her off with a grimace and she was halfway down the street before she slipped the stolen fruit from her sleeves, and the twenty ryō which he’d had left out on the side, that was shoved into her purse.

She didn’t take his suspicion personally because he had every right to be suspicious.

“Now, _I know_ you didn’t pay for that, kid.”

A hand clamped down on her shoulder and Rin froze.

Stomach dropping to her knees and she realised she’d been caught. It wasn’t the vendor, she hadn’t heard him yell or the distinct thwap of his broom.

_No_ , someone else had seen her.

She thought she’d been careful

This was it. Matron Saeko was going to skin her alive and use her flesh as a rug. Done for, she was _dead meat._

Her head tilted back and she stared up at the mess of blonde hair.

“Don’t you own a brush?”

She needed to learn to control her mouth.

The man laughed though, a bit too happy considering he’d just caught a thief. His shiny hitaite glimmering as he moved, _Shinobi_ , flak jacket? Chunin or higher.

“Let me guess, the allowance wouldn’t cover the whole thing?” He murmured, his eyes sliding over to her basket of fruit and veg. He didn’t say anything about the bit of extra money he’d seen her stuff into her small purse.

A thick lump swelled in her throat.

Rin knew one when she saw one.

Those in a similar boat as herself, or had been in the past, it was increasingly obvious when you knew what to look for. It left a mark that followed you around, no matter the rank or a person's abilities. Orphans who had managed to swing the limited, and highly coveted, Academy spaces.

“Why not something a little sweeter kid? I used to waste all my money on animtsu,” He grumbled, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly.

“...aren’t you supposed to be telling me off?”

It wasn’t like she wanted him to, but, it was a little confusing actually.

“I am, I’m telling you off for not buying more sweets, didn’t you hear?”

Shinobi were weird.

“I mean for stealing.”

The man grinned at her.

( _The echo_ **_sang_ ** _.)_

It wasn’t exactly a comfortable sensation but it did make Rin stand up and pay a little more attention to who she was talking to. His warm hand gently guiding her, pushing her further and further down the street.

Away from the scene of the crime.

“You were stealing? Huh, guess I didn’t see that.”

“You _literally_ stopped me because you said that you knew I didn’t pay for my stuff,” Rin  was quick to point out.

Some part of her was screaming to _shut up_ , why was she tempting fate? An eyebrow arched and she looked decidedly unimpressed with the holes in his story.

The shinobi looked equally unimpressed, his expression falling flat into what could only be described as a pout. Folding his arms over his chest with a soft huff as they made it to the bottom of the road.

“You know, most kids would be happy at not being pulled up for stealing.”

“Most kids don’t get stopped by weird shinobi, just smacked around a little.”

It was blunt and without tact.

Rin mindfully said nothing about the way he twitched at her comment.

The dark expression that flickered across his features told her enough, told her that he remembered similar experiences because orphans weren’t anything to be protected or cherished. From the get-go they were told they were burdens.

Sometimes it didn’t need to be said, it was just the way they were treated.

Callously.

With reluctance and without affection.

Not many people cared and it was a fact of life that Rin tried not to be bitter over.

( _T_ _he echo whispered that she was more than a little bitter_.)

“Yeah well, that’s not how it should be,” he muttered, dark expression washed away as he crouched down so he could look her in the eye. Hands resting on his knees. “You applying for the Academy?”

“I’m going to try,” because all she _can_ do is try.

He nodded.

Konoha was better than some of the other hidden villages, or at least that’s what they’re told. The Academy is expensive for those who didn’t have the money, Clan’s paid certain taxes which meant their children got in with relative ease. Civilians could apply and be funded through with sponsorships or just pay out of their own pockets.

For the orphans, there were at most five spaces every year.

Tuition was covered by the Hokage and they were reminded about it for the rest of their Shinobi career that they should even be _grateful_ to be there.

Not dead in a ditch, not a runaway, not in a dead end job.

“Does it get better?”

“For some, it does,” he didn’t sugarcoat it. That was good. Rin didn’t need or want that. She wasn’t made of glass and if she was going to the Academy, she’d be made of iron by the end. “The best thing to do is to get in there and prove them all wrong.”

“Right.”

Rin doesn’t need to ask anything else, grabbing her goods and she aimed to be back at the orphanage with enough time to bribe the cook into letting her use the good kitchen equipment.

The shinobi stopped her once more, grinning when she rolled her eyes at him.

( _The echo preens and Rin fights the instinct to lean into the hand he’d place on her head_.)

“What’s your name kid?”

“Nohara Rin.”

“Namikaze Minato, I’ll see you in a few years.”

He says it so surely, with a beaming grin and _all that hair_. She simply stands there and stares at him as he stands to his full height, wandering off with a wave.

( _The echo pings again and tells her, yeah, yeah she will_.)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Academy applications were a pain in the ass.

Academy applications opened a few weeks later. 

Five places.  _ Five students _ . 

No give or take. 

It was why  _ Scars _ and  _ Burns _ turned up at their humble abode on the very same day. 

To civilians and orphans, the shinobi lifestyle had either been twisted into something cruel and brutal or it had been overly-glamorized. The former was probably the closest to the truth. 

Even with that mind, it didn’t lessen the swell of orphans which clamoured for that so-called better life, the prospect of a steady income. Having the shinobi lifestyle being idealised pretty much ensured that these placements offered for the Academy were never empty. However, it also meant that numbers needed to be cut even before the applications were submitted. 

_ Burns  _ and  _ Scars _ were the first lines of defence. 

Older orphans, the ones who’d aged out, they’d told her about  _ Academy Day _ .

An orphan could only apply to the Academy twice but they’d been around to see enough of these Academy days. When the scariest shinobi were sent to talk with the overly-eager and somewhat naive orphans.  

The two didn’t give their names, so Rin simply named them for their visibly noticeable attributes. 

_ Scars _ was covered in them.

Of varied length, depth and texture. Some were gruesome, the ragged edges and torn flesh obviously accomplished with a serrated blade. His small and beady eyes missed by mere millimeters with a slash that had faded with age. Some were so deep that they seemed to carve a literal chunk of flesh out of him. 

His smile told everyone in the room that whoever had taken that chunk and given some of theirs as payment,  _ with interest _ . 

_ Burns _ stood on the right, shoulder to shoulder with his partner. 

He may have looked a little softer but the skin around his shoulders and neck were puckered with ageing burns. Bandages tightly wrapped around his forearms, skin a livid pink that spoke of fresher wounds. The faint specks of red slowly bleeding through. 

Both waited silently at the front of the room as the group filtered into the room. 

It was a crowd of twenty,  _ maybe thirty _ , orphans. All who’d been lining up the Academy Talk. 

Rin and a few others knew that it wasn’t as easy as the others were making it out to be. This was simply the first step. The others, however, had taken it at face value and assumed it to be the selection process. Chattering loudly between themselves, they looked pumped and excited about the entire experience. 

Her eyes flicked over to the Matron of their establishment, the woman who ran the entire place. 

Matron Saeko seemed to have a particular distaste for the shinobi at th front of the room, however, the lines were deep in her face and there was a resigned slump in her spine of steel. 

“Alright, maggots,” Scars cheered, his voice husky, almost croaky and it demanded their attention. The chatter died away as soon as he spoke up, moving forwards towards their little huddle. “You’re all here today because you all  _ think _ you have a shot of getting into the Academy, and it’s our duty to basically tell you that it’s a load of bullshit.”

It’s said bluntly, with a grin. A feral kind of grin which showed too many teeth, like staring into the mouth of a shark. 

A shark who was having way too much fun. 

He took a heavy step forward and one of the girls at the front, Rin couldn’t remember her name and didn’t really care fo it, flinched away from him with a quiet yelp. Her lip wobbling when his glare fell on her, burning like the sun. 

Rin’s eyes snapped over as  _ Burns _ twitched his fingers in a distinct manner. 

The Matron called her name and the girl trotted over, ushered out of the room. 

_ Out of sight and out of mind _ . 

It’s enough to make the other children stand up a little straighter, realise that this wasn’t going to be as easy as they’d initially thought. The girl didn’t come back in the room, there were no second chances. The door was the exit, the end, game over to those who were applying for their second and last chance. 

_ There were only five spaces _ , it’d been repeated over and over but it probably didn’t sink in until then. 

You could have heard the starry-eyed dreams  _ pop _ , their daydreams about going to the Academy with their friends, about a shinobi lifestyle? It was all crushed underfoot. 

This was  _ competitive. Selective _ . 

Not everyone in the room would go to the Academy and for some, their dreams would end up completely crashing and burning. Everyone was now a threat. There was no time, no room for allies. 

“Some of you will already know, but we’re teetering on the brink of war,”  _ Burns  _ said. His voice is softer, much like his appearance and there’s a melodious quality to it that Rin hated on principle. “You’ll be sent out on the frontlines in a few years so we’re choosing those with the highest chances of surviving.”

“Surviving doesn’t always mean coming away with ten fingers and toes,”  _ Scars _ swept around the room,  _ Burns _ eyes keenly following and watching for those who flinched or did  _ anything _ which they wouldn’t tolerate. There would be no show of weakness, these were Konoha shinobi. 

If they were scared of their own comrades, then what happened when they were confronted by the enemy?

_ Scars _  began to tell his stories about his own time on the front lines, on a mission or whatever. His over-the-top gestures to his own injuries used for emphasis but Rin lets her gaze slip past to his partner. 

Usually when shinobi are saying “ _ Look at me! Look at me! _ ”, chances are you should be looking elsewhere. 

Maybe she was paranoid. 

She met  _ Burns _ gaze head-on. 

( _ The echo hummed, almost amused because she most certainly wasn’t paranoid _ .)

The talk lasted for half an hour and by then, at least ten children had been escorted out of the room for an abundance of reasons. 

One girl almost fainted when  _ Scars _ went into riveting detail about a mission where he’d gutted an enemy shinobi. 

One boy left of his own volition so he could be sick. 

Some were cocky and spoke out of turn. 

All had to walk past her to leave the room.

The two of them looked rather pleased with themselves after everything was said and done, the crowd looking a little smaller and the room feeling a little tighter despite it. 

“We'll hand out the forms required, fill them in to the best of your abilities,”  _ Burns _ told the remaining orphans. He handed them out, one by one, with a personal touch. His eyes skimming over their heads and he looked contemplative. 

Rin stepped up at some point, taking her form with faltering. 

His lips twisted into a small smirk. 

The adults asked to speak to the Matron alone once all the applications had been handed out. The glare she sent cowed the children into obedience, Rin could feel the swell of dread that only the Matron could inspire. 

She had yet to meet anyone who scared her more. 

The children neatly pouring out of the room and finding any flat surface to write on, filling out their forms diligently.

Rin had other plans though and crept into the kitchens, smiling at Senzo, the chef who volunteered there, who dramatically pretended to turn a blind eye as she hopped onto the counter next to him.

The two quietly going about their business. 

He rolled his dough out. 

She flicked through her pages, eyes skimming through the questions before even beginning to attempt to fill out the form.  

A lot of it was pretty basic: who were her parents? Did she have any other living relatives? Did she have next of kin? 

Then it started wanting details like her height, her weight and even her rank aspirations. 

The questions seemed to vary between personal and clinical.  

“Academy Day, hm?” Senzo finally murmured, slapping the lump of dough down onto the flour crusted counter. A flume of white flour smacking his apron. “ _ Yeah _ , that’s always a shit-show every year.”

“How many y’seen?” Rin asked, eyes focused on her forms as she continued to fill in the questions:  _ how would she describe her mental health? On a scale on 1 to 10… _

“Maybe five, six? Probably more.”

“You don’t look a day over forty,” Rin reassured him with an absent-minded pat to the arm. 

“I’m thirty-two.”

( _ The echo chose strange times to flare, most of the time it was probably trying to be helpful or guiding her in a certain way. Other times, times like this, it wasn’t really doing  _ **_anything_ ** _ other than making her feel bad. It tried to wiggle this warmth into her, make her be a little nicer, to apologise and unruffle feathers.) _

Rin didn’t like it. 

"Of course you are," she patted his arm again with an indulgent smile. 

"Brat," it’s said fondly, there's a small smile curling his lips. "Y’know, you get into the Academy, you get kicked outta here, you realize that?"

“That’s only after I graduate,” and isn’t that the entire point of it? Why else would she be doing this. No one wanted to stay in the Orphanage past a certain age. 

Those who did were turned into cautionary tales. 

Like the rumour that Matron Saeko had once been an orphan but had stayed so long it  _ consumed her soul _ . 

Rin questioned whoever thought she had a soul in the first place. 

“Why?” Finally looking up from her papers, she grinned at him, fluttering her eyelashes in an obnoxious way like the waitress did down the road whenever Senzo visited. “Y’gonna miss me?”

She coughed and sputtered when a cloud of flour smacked her face. 

“ _ Rude _ .”

* * *

The deadline for their applications was three days after they’d first been handed out. 

If you missed that window, Matron Saeko was very clear because other than developing an entirely new  _ and all powerful  _ dōjutsu or being revealed as a prodigy overnight, there was no chance of receiving a place. 

And since Rin was pretty damn sure her eyes wouldn’t be doing any of that crazy shit and that prodigy status was  _ hilariously  _ out of reach, handing in the papers promptly seemed to be the best idea. 

When an applicant hands their forms in, everyone received the same receipt. 

It was a tiny scrap of paper with their identification number, her name and a small standard thank you that was supposedly from the Hokage. All the usual,  _ thank you for applying to work in the name of Konohagakure, your service will be much appreciated _ , blah blah blah. 

It also gave a timeframe of when they’d be hearing back about the results of their applications. Usually, within a month they’d hear back on whether or not they’d been successful, as was the norm with the rest of the applicants. 

_ However _ , Rin received her acceptance letter  _ four _ days later. 

It was barely five sentences long and told her the basics. 

She’d been successful,  _ obviously _ , and that she’d received a tuition-paid placement at the Academy. Before attending, she’d have a one-to-one talk with the Hokage, as would the rest of the accepted applicants. When the month was up and the placements were filled, she’d received a basic care-package which would include: three kunai, a set of shuriken and a holster. 

Whilst she was thrilled-

( _ The echo was positively buzzing with excitement. _ )

-She also knew better than to flaunt this sort of thing around. Her acceptance letter hidden and when she wasn’t in in the Orphanage, it was kept on her person at all times. 

There wasn’t such a thing as private property in an overcrowded orphanage. 

Did you leave something out? You weren’t going to get it back. 

The letter was burning in her pocket when they were all at dinner, the table crowded around as they ate their stew. Matron Saeko slowly walking through the door. 

“Rin,  _ a word _ ,” she called. 

Her voice inspiring a hush and the command was expected to be followed, the Matron strolling away. The table, all of the other children, they stared at her with varying measures of pity. 

_ Oh, she was dead meat. _

( _ Not yet, the echo seemed to laugh against her chest. _ )

Rin ducked her head and scampered after the woman, chin tucked against her chest and she looked appropriately remorseful for…  _ whatever _ she’d done. 

She couldn’t think of one isolated incident, there was a lot of possibilities. 

She just didn’t think she’d been  _ caught _ . 

“ _ Oh _ , stop looking like you’re being sent off to slaughter, you’re not in trouble,” Matron Saeko tutted, arm folded over her chest with a roll of her eyes but otherwise her expression was a blank slate. “I’ve been asked to talk to you about your application for the Academy.”

“To the academy?” Rin echoed, more than a little confused. 

“You’ve probably already heard back by now that you’ve been accepted for one of the placements,” she steamrolled, not giving a moment to explain. There was a no-nonsense policy with the Matron and Rin quickly nodded as not to irritate her. “Good, I’ve been asked to speak with you because of a few… red flags in your application.”

“But I was accepted?”

“You have been accepted unless you answer my questions wrong,” the Matron informed her. 

_ Okay, wow,  _ **_fuck_ ** . 

“Your parents, before they passed away, were civilians,” it wasn’t a question. 

_ Nohara Takai and Nohara Hatsumomo _ . 

Rin had scant memories of her parents, they were mainly faceless blurs. She remembered laughing a lot with them, her mother had the same purple Clan markings as herself, she’d a smile that was a little too mischevious for comfort. It was a smile she clung to. And her father, all she could remember was that he was  _ jolly _ . He came home covered in bandages and bruises from a hard days work and she’d play doctor with him. 

He’d always loved the makeshift toilet roll bandages she’d drape over him. 

There was a thick lump in her throat. 

"I think so."

“You put that they were originally from Sungakure.”

Rin was meek looking up at the older woman, “they moved here before I was born.”

In tense times like this, it made sense they were so untrusting. Suna was quickly gaining a foothold in a war that was swelling. The tensions were high between most countries and the gossip was rife on when the shit would hit the fan. 

The Matron hummed thoughtfully. 

“You put down that your chakra coils are active,”  _ which was correct _ . “And that your reserves are slowly expanding.”

“I… did.”

“Rin, you do realise that eighty-five percent of civilian born children have to have their chakra coils forcibly activated to even be able to tap into their chakra?”

Rin’s eyes widened. 

“And since we don’t have records of such a procedure,” the killing intent was a meandering thing, lazy and light but  _ present _ . It was pressing down on her chest whilst the echo pressed back. It was difficult to breathe. “So I’ll ask you once, have you been in contact with any foreign shinobi?”

Rin shook her head with a speed that it threatened to drop off. 

“Have you received any sort of training?”

Another head shake. 

“Do you have any affiliations with the other hidden villages?”

“No ma’am.”

There was a beat of silence and the older woman scoured her features with her own eyes. She seemed to find what she was looking for because the killing intent seeped away and Rin sighed in relief, just for being able to breathe a little easier once more. 

“Good, Namikaze-san spoke highly of you, I’d hate for you to disappoint him,” Matron Saeko scoffed.

"Namikaze Minato?"

Rin blinked.

The Matron looked terribly amused by her confusion. 

( _ The echo chimed happily at the mere mention of his name _ .)

“You didn’t know? One of the reasons your application was expedited was because he formally applied to be your sponsor for the Academy.”

“I’ve only spoken with him once,”  _ at length, when she was committing a crime _ . 

“Whatever was said obviously impacted him,” the older woman brushed it off as if it was an everyday thing but they both knew otherwise. Orphans didn’t  _ get _ sponsors. “He seemed very enthusiastic about helping you along in your,  _ how did he put it _ , path to proving us all wrong.”

A cold sweat broke out on her neck. 

_ Goddamn Namikaze Minato, getting her into trouble _ . 

( _ The echo laughed and laughed and laughed _ .)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Academy might be a pain in the ass but that doesn't mean that everyone that goes there are complete idiots. 
> 
> (Rin just thought the majority of them were.)

The Third Hokage was a formidable man. 

He was the famed teacher of the Legendary Sannin, a student of the Nidaime, the renowned  _ Professor _ .  

It didn’t change the fact that he was an  _ old _ man by appearance alone. 

In fact, he’d been considered an old man by a shinobi’s standards for quite a while. 

If anything, it was a testament to how strong he truly was. No one really retired quietly in their line of work, let alone Hokages.    
  
With that in mind, Rin hesitated by the door to his office.    


She’d been greeted by the secretary,  _ a pretty woman with a disarming smile and a predatory presence _ , informed her that the Hokage would see her now. It was only when the door shut behind her did the possibility of the woman being a covert ANBU operative even became a though because she couldn’t  _ see _ any visible guards. 

_ Oh, they were there _ . 

Somewhere. 

Still, the Hokage had a somewhat grandfatherly vibe to him but looks could be deceiving. He looked small, sat by his desk and drowning in his robes, the large hat sat upon his skull. Rin always thought the Hokage hats looked rather ridiculous but then again, they were supposed to be a little over the top to set them apart from the rest of the shinobi in their ranks. 

“Nohara-kun, please, take a seat,” the Third told her, gesturing towards the seat which had been placed in front of his desk. 

It quite obviously  _ didn’t _ belong there but it’d been placed there with their meeting in mind. 

She sat down without saying anything, her legs kicking absentmindedly, not even close to touching the floor. She was rather small for a six-year-old after all. Her hands folded into the lap of her black qipao dress.

He smiled, glancing back down at the papers in front of him and signed whatever he was working on with an over-exaggerated flourish. Adding it to the thick pile on his right side.    


She wasn’t naive enough to think that it was anything close to classified, or that she even had a shot of looking at whatever it was that he’d been signing. Though curiosity did niggle at her,  _ ever so slightly _ . 

“I assume you know why you’re here,” the Hokage said, leaning back in his chair, pipe hanging from his lips and smoke billowing.

"About the Academy."   
  
He nodded sagely, eyes half-mast as he watched her.   
  
Rin couldn’t help but squirm underneath his scrutiny, fidgeting like she was guilty of something. 

She didn’t know  _ what _ but she was usually guilty of something. 

“I like to have a talk with everyone who takes a paid placement in the Academy, I’m sure you can understand why,” he offered. He was shrewd and he was clever but all Rin could focus on was the fact that his pipe smelled like the cigarette smoke from the bar across the road from the orphanage. 

The patrons weren’t allowed to smoke inside anymore and the smell seeped across the streets and through their window. 

Rin hated the smell and tried to stop her nose from wrinkling too visibly. 

With her lack of reply, the Hokage mistook it for confusion.    


“As much as we’d like to pave the way for all of your cohorts, Konoha simply doesn’t have the funds to put all of those in a… similar position as yourself through the Academy,” he was delicate about the subject but she heard the tiny pause. “Clan’s pay taxes that ensure their children can attend, Civilians pay their tuition fees and the income from the Academy helps support Konoha as much as the missions they train for.”

It’s a long-winded way of saying  _ Sorry! You can’t pay, you can’t play _ . 

( _ The echo berates her softly. _ )   
  
“With that in mind, these spots are highly coveted and, in turn, the elders and myself have certain expectations of those who take them.”   
  
Rin tried not to show her nerves but shifted in her seat, fidgeting once more.    
  
The Hokage smiled.   
  
“Of course, we’re not expecting perfect marks or anything of the sort,” he’s quick to reassure, puffing away merrily at his pipe. His voice is soft and Rin’s reminded that he’s a father of two already, can see it in the way he’s gentle with how he speaks. “All we’re asking is that you maintain a top thirty position with your year group.”

She hummed in quiet agreement,  _ what was there to agree to?  _ She had no choice. 

Rin didn’t meet the man's eyes because whilst she respected the man, she didn’t trust him and if she was being entirely honest, he made her uncomfortable. Perhaps she just didn’t do well with authority figures because the Matron inspired the same sort of gut-churning unease.    
  
It wasn’t exactly a good trait for a shinobi to have. 

“One thing I noted, your application was sponsored by,” there’s a pause and the Hokage shuffled through his stash of papers as if he couldn’t exactly recall who had sponsored her application. Which Rin knew was complete bullshit since not every orphan got a sponsor,  _ let alone _ , had their application expedited  _ because _ of it. The Hokage smiled as he seemed to pull out the correct file. “Namikaze Minato, you know him well?”   
  
“I met him a few weeks ago,” she offered with a helpless shrug, once again squirming under his gaze. “We spoke a little but, I thought that was it.”   
  
“Minato-kun was in a similar position as yourself a few years back,” the Hokage went on to say, looking thoughtful as he peered over, what she assumed to be, her file. “He wrangled the top five position whilst in the Academy and he’s gone on to be a fine addition to our ranks.”

( _ The echo started to glow just at the mere mention of him and Rin was starting to dislike him on principle alone. Who knew? Without him sponsoring her, maybe she wouldn’t have got into the Academy? Maybe this was going to hang over her head for the rest of her life? His name, his influence. It wasn't something she liked the think about but it was something she was beginning to think about the more and more his name was thrown around. _ )   
  
“I believe he saw the same potential in you, Nohara-kun.”   


And whilst it was all very flattering, her chin tucked to her chest as she tried to quell the blush that crawled up her neck, she didn’t exactly believe him. He was too nice, Namikaze. There were probably a thousand more deserving individuals, more than enough in the orphanage who needed,  _ who deserved _ , the Academy placements more than herself. 

She wasn’t going to say that though. 

“I’ll do my best to make Konoha proud,” she said instead, head bowed and her eyes focused on the carpet of his office. 

There was a soft creak of his chair as the Hokage leaned back, pipe-puffing strongly as he eyed her.    
  
"I'm sure you will, Nohara-kun," was all he had to offer.

* * *

Nue, Ginjiro, Kyosuke and Taro all received confirmations of their placements by the end of the month. 

Rin remained silent about her early acceptance and clutched the standard care package close to her chest.    


* * *

The Academy was familiar. 

The orphanage gave them basic tools, basic skills which would help them but other than that, they were left to flounder. In those few early years they were grouped together to learn how to read, to write, basic mathematics and other skills that a lot of people took for granted when they had a family to teach them. 

In the orphanage, a different teacher took them for each class, most of the time they only lasted in the mornings before they were somebody else's problem. They were let loose and ran riot amongst the public. 

The Academy wasn’t all too different. 

Their days might be a little longer and they had only one teacher the majority of the time. Naoko-sensei was a kind and fair instructor even if she was a little strict, she rarely called on anyone for the sheer enjoyment of embarrassing her students but she wouldn’t put up with  _ ‘tomfoolery _ ’, as she put it  

There wasn’t any physical training, not in the first year at least but there was lingering fear about surmounting tensions. 

Rin wouldn’t have put it past them that their class was already ahead of the curve. 

Some, like Hatake Kakashi, her classmate of a day, had already been moved up a few years and was probably going to graduate within the year despite being two years younger than herself.    
  
"Do you mind if I sit here with you?"   
  
Rin glanced up from her lunch.   


Hibari Nue had been the only other girl accepted for placement. Somewhat soft-spoken and a little distant, their pact was one forged out of their hatred for the other girls in their class.    


In the beginning, it became increasingly obvious that those there on  _ placement _ had to prove themselves in a way which Clan or even Civilian children didn’t have to. They didn’t really have a lot going for them, they had no families to fall back on and most of the time, the other children avoided them outside of the classroom.

( _ The echo curled in on itself, upset and disappointed _ .)

The boys, Ginjiro, Kyosuke… and the other one which Rin could never remember his name for the life of her, they all seemed to find their niche quickly enough. Ginjiro was rambunctious enough that the rowdy troublemakers of the class welcome him with open arms. 

So, without the boys, Rin and Nue were forced to make an alliance.     
  
“Sure,” Rin shuffled over on the bench to make room, Nue quietly taking her seat and unpacking her lunch. For once, she didn’t let the awkward silence linger. “How’s your day been?”

Nue didn’t seem surprised by her somewhat chattier behaviour than usual.    
  
“Some of the other girls pushed me down and said mean things about my hair,” Nue said with the same tone that one would use when describing the colour of the sky. From the little Rin knew about Nue, she didn’t seem to have a lot of friends and she didn’t really care for a lot of social interaction. 

When she said this sort of thing, Nue didn’t care for pity or sympathy.  _ A fact was a fact _ . 

Rin had asked how her day had been, she was merely describing the events.    
  
"Which girls?" Rin asked, eyes scouring their class.    
  
"The two Uchiha kunoichis and their tag-along," with a vague motion, Rin spotted them undereath the sakura trees. They seemed to be having a great time, grinning and gossiping, a little taller than the rest of their class. "They said my hair was a disgusting colour and that's why my parents left me at the Orphanage."   
  
Rin blinked.   
  
"Do you want me to do something?"   


That was what garnered an odd look, Nue stared at her for what seemed like a while before a smile curled her mouth. It was coy and faint. “No thank you, I have it handled.”

Rin knew better than to ask. 

She didn’t like a lot of classes at the Academy,  _ kunoichi classes _ were in her opinion a waste of time for herself. Genjutsu was  _ interesting _ at least, she didn’t have the reserves for ninjutsu and apparently their taijutsu spars weren’t allowed until next year, so she couldn’t beat the shit out of anyone just yet. 

Nue, however, excelled in their kunoichi classes. More specifically,  _ poisons _ . 

Rin wouldn’t be surprised if the three girls came down with an  _ unfortunate _ case of food poisoning.    
  
Between what little after-school work they were given and studying, she took the time out the build up her muscles. The echo happily leaning her into the correct poses for her katas. Nue had her own style which was from her family, something she taught bits and pieces to Rin, all flexibility and movements, using your own weight and force against someone. 

With her allowance, she’d bought a set of basic weights, thick black cuffs that were worn around her ankles and her wrists. They moved and chafed a little until she bound them with bandages. Steadily improving since then and anxiously awaiting the time they’d be allowed to spar.    


The orphanage had a small training ground around the back, just out of sight and lined with a chain link fence that made the place feel  _ so  _ much more homely. 

Rin scoffed as she strolled in, no one in-

The blur dropping from the trees startled her-   
  
"Hey! I was here first-"   
  
They didn’t get to finish since Rin punched them in the face.

"Shit! I'm so sorry," Rin apologised, a little shocked by her own reflexes, flexing and shaking her hand to try and stop the ache. 

Ginjiro laid at her feet, sprawled out, his hand clamped over his nose.   
  
"You punched me!" He squawked. 

It came out a little nasally since he was using one hand to clamp over his nose and stop the blood, using his free hand to point at her accusingly. She swung back, leaning away from him with a scowl. 

( _ The echo could try to make her feel as guilty as it wanted, this boy was a brat though _ .)

Whatever guilt she'd had about landing her fist in his face was quickly dwindling, flatlining,  _ shrinking  _ into nothing.   
  
"You startled me!"   
  
"That doesn't mean you should punch me!"   
  
"I'm pretty sure punching things that scare me is a good defence mechanism!" Rin huffed, her hands now on her hips as she glowered down at him. There was a faint throb in her knuckles which told her that she probably did a fair bit of damage.   
  
Not that she really cared by that point.   
  
The five of them which had been accepted were a ticking time bomb. 

A few months into their training and only a small area to work with? They either trained in the Academy’s grounds or at the small space the orphanage offered. With such a competitive edge, having to remain in the top thirty in their year? They were constantly stepping on one another's toes. 

"I think you broke my nose," Ginjiro insisted.   
  
"There's not enough blood, you haven't got instant black eyes, you're fine," Rin rolled her eyes, muttering under her breath. " _ Big baby _ ."   
  
“Better a baby than a  _ bitch _ ,” Ginjiro snapped back. 

It was with the same smugness of a child who used a  _ bad word _ , he probably didn’t even know what the word meant, not that she could really take it seriously since his voice was still slightly pitched. His nose still clamped down and maybe Rin was a little viciously satisfied to seem him bleed. 

( _ The echo flinched because what was  _ **_wrong_ ** _ with her? _ )

It never really bothered her before she realised what she was missing, this carefully calculated distance she had from everyone. 

Her tentative and new alliance,  _ because it wasn’t friendship quite yet _ , with Nue. It was something that was a breath of fresh air, it was something startling and different and  _ nice.  _ It didn’t seem like an adequate word to describe it, Rin didn’t like to talk to a lot of people her own age and had been let to her own devices for a long time.   
  
Eyes stinging and there as a lump in her throat, Rin knew that Ginjiro’s opinion meant close to nothing to her but it just  _ hurt _ . 

( _ The echo told her it was okay to hurt _ .)

( _ The echo was wrong. _ )

She did the only reasonable thing that came to mind at that point. 

. . . She punched him again. 

“ _ Now _ , your nose is broken,” Rin hissed.    


Her feet took her wherever she needed to go, storming off and heading towards a different training ground lest she double back and make sure that his nose was  _ properly _ broken. She didn’t doubt that he squeal to the Matron or maybe even Naoko-sensei. 

( _ The echo  _ **_flared.)_ **

_ ( go there- go that way-  _ **_that_ ** _ way-  _ **_that way!_ ** _ ) _

It wasn't soft or nudging as it had been in the past few weeks. She thought it had been getting better, instead, it was a raging heat against her breastbone which demanded attention.   
  
Rin did her best to ignore it but it seemed to get worse and worse with every stomp she took towards the other training grounds.   
  
It was pulling her towards the Academy.   
  
Now, Rin was stubborn. She was as stubborn as a mule on the best of days, a viciousness and a will to do things her own way. That included ignoring the warmth of her chest which was flaring somewhat uncomfortably in her chest.   
  
"No," she hissed to herself. "No, nope, not happening, not happening."   
  
(Rin would later look back at that moment and realise she probably looked insane.)   
  
That’s when it  **hurt** . 

The pain in her chest, it wasn’t an echo, it was a sharp and gasping sort of pain that made her stop dead in her tracks. A hand clamped over her chest as she struggled to breathe. 

“Goddamnit.”

When the world stopped spinning and the pain lessened, Rin’s feet eventually turned her so she was walking towards where the godawful sensation was pulling her. It wouldn't stop otherwise, she'd never get any sort of training done… if she even made it to the training grounds in the first place.    
  
There was no one using the Academy training grounds at that point, it was blissfully empty.   
  
Suspicious. 

Maybe there was something she was supposed to avoid at the other training fields? The tension slipped out of her shoulders as she slipped her kunai out of her holster, standard issue and came with the small care package. The metal was heavy but at the same time, a comforting weight which you got used to. 

The targets were well-used and had seen better days, they were replaced monthly but they were still a little shabby. 

Despite there being no one,  _ not a single person _ , she still felt uneasy. 

The tension might have eased but there was a prickle at the back of her neck and the echo hummed happily. Maybe she should just go to the library, Nue was there looking into poisonous plants indigenous to Konoha and Fire country.    
  
Turning on her heel-

_ Thwack! _   
  
“ _ Mother- _ !”    
  
Rin stumbled back, rubbing her forehead, eyes closed as she tried to stop the ringing in her ears.   
  
Opening her eyes  _ hurt _ and when she did, she glared incredulously at the boy who was hung upside down from the overhanging trees. There was no chakra involved, his feet were literally hooked around the branch rather than sticking himself to the bark. 

She might’ve been a little more lenient if he had been since that sort of control so early on was pretty impressive. 

He was an Academy student, much like herself and she was sure she’d seen him around.    
  
He rubbed at the small red spot on his own forehead.   
  
_ Served him right. _   
  
"Oh my god, I'm so sorry!" The boy suddenly began to babble, his eyes wide in concern even as he swung back and forth precariously; threatening to topple from his perch. "I thought the branch was higher than this!"   
  
"Obviously not," Rin griped.   
  
The two of them rubbed their head in pained unison,  _ headbutting _ ? Not fun.   
  
“You’re Rin, right?” The boy said, head tilting but he didn’t seem to care that he was still hung upside down from the branch. His arms now hanging loose over his head like lim noodles, not that he seemed to notice or care about that either.    
  
Like it was completely normal.   
  
"That's me," she murmured, an eyebrow raised as she took another step back.   
  
"Cool! I've been meaning to say hi, I'm Obito, I see you every now and then in the library!" He chirped, grinning from cheek to cheek which was slightly masked by the orange goggles he wore.   
  
"Nice… to meet you?"

( _ The echo burnt against her chest and Rin hated it, hated him. _ )   
  
She should’ve just gone to the library in the first place. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays folks!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wild Obito appears and sticks around. It's not something which Rin had actually considered a possibility.

Obito was a thorn in her side. 

A pest. 

A nuisance. 

They’d spoken  _ once _ . 

Apparently, in his eyes, that meant they were best friends for life. 

( _ The echo laughed, a flutter against her chest but Rin doesn’t acknowledge it. Refused to acknowledge it now. She didn’t realise the echo could hurt her before, what else could it do? _ )

Nue caught onto what was happening a few days later after he’d approached them during Academy hours twice-over. She thought he was sweet, definitely nicer than some of the other Uchiha’s which they’d had the pleasure of encountering. 

( _ The Uchiha girls and their tag along, the one which had taunted her and pushed Nue? They'd missed a week and a half of the Academy. Something about an upset stomach. _

_ When they heard the news, Rin turned to her friend expectantly. Nue tried to look like the picture of innocence, “I heard a bug was going around.” and she would’ve succeeded too if it wasn’t for the satisfied smirk curling her lips. _ )

“Why do you keep doing this?” Rin eventually asked. 

Obito sat cross-legged in the grass with them, rubbing the back of his neck with a blush. 

Rin and Nue had been completely focused on target practice. At least, they had been until  _ someone _ thought it would be a good idea to sneak up on them,  _ accidentally he claimed! _ Which resulted in three kunai skimming him and one nicking the collar of his shirt, drawing a little blood with the faintest scratch. 

His high pitched scream would be the highlight of her week though, whenever she needed a good laugh, she’d think back to it. 

“Keep doing what?” Obito asked. 

He was clueless. 

“Why’d you keep coming to talk to me?”

“Oh,” Obito blinked. He looked a little taken aback like it hadn’t even crossed his mind that he shouldn’t, that it was unusual for him to continue to try and speak with her. “I don’t know actually, I just think it’d be really nice for us to be friends.”

Nue’s laughter quickly turned into coughs when Rin turned to glare at her, eyes wide with mirth as she hacked and spluttered. 

“Friends don’t sneak up on one another during kunai practice.” 

“Friends  _ also _ don’t try to kill one another,” Obito grumbled, rubbing at the shallow cut along the side of his neck. 

Her mouth twitched and she fought not to smile.  

“Good thing we’re not friends then,” she agreed, hands on her hips and lips pursed. 

“Eh, I think we’re friends,” he was a brat. 

“I’m not nice enough for friends.”

Rin reached around, pinching the flesh of Nue’s arms when the girl began to nod in solemn agreement to the statement. Nue hissing, she moved away lest she be in range to be pinched again. 

“You’re nice when it matters,” Obito shrugged. 

“Nothing really matters, that’s all about perspective.”

“Then, _ in my perspective _ , you’re nice when it matters.”

There’s a small pause as they stared one another down. 

Obito was constantly adjusting the goggles he wears, eventually giving up and adjusting them to sit on top of his head. Rin just frowns at him though. 

It wasn’t that she didn’t like him, it was that she didn’t like what happened when he was around, it was no different than with Namikaze. The echo just  _ glowed _ , it was the strongest it ever was when they were around she  _ hated _ the thought of the two of them together. 

( _ The echo whispers about trust and trying new things! _ )

(Rin doesn’t want to try new things, she doesn’t want to obey this  _ feeling _ , this non-entity which had been dragging her around for so long, without her realising.)

“You’re stubborn.”

“I’m an Uchiha.”

Rin spluttered because didn’t know how to argue with that and didn’t have to since Nue broke the pause with an inelegant snort. 

“Well,” she murmured with a helpless smile. “He’s not wrong.”

_ Traitor,  _ Rin’s eyes screamed,  _ this is a complete and utter betrayal _ . 

Nue simply rolled her eyes.

Obito grinned, eyes flicking between the two girls as they bickered, even if he was a little confused by the whole turn of events. He wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth though, simply flattening his mouth to smile innocently when Rin glared at him once more. 

( _ He’s so young, the echo groaned. He still had a bit of baby fat, still had that glimmer of innocence, that carefree attitude, alivealive _ **_alive_ ** _ - _ )

The echo was warm against her chest but it just sparked rebellion in Rin. 

She wanted to scream and cry and argue and demand the right to pick her friends for herself,  _ pick her own people _ . 

“Why’d you keep coming to talk to me?” Rin asked again. 

This time Obito actually stopped to consider her question, head tilted and his words were hesitant and vulnerable. “‘Cause you look as lonely as I feel sometimes.”

If she flinched, no one said anything. 

It was like a missing piece really, there hadn’t been a lot she could rely on, anyone who was really there for her without an agenda. It was the same with everyone in her situation, Nue looked distinctly uncomfortable with the turn the conversation had taken.

For a village which was all about exceptional teamwork and their loyalty, Rin felt detached. 

She felt… unconnected. 

She just didn’t understand.

There wasn’t anything special about this place in comparison to the next village or the next one, there could be  _ a billion _ villages. 

If she was honest, if it came down to it?

_ She’d watch them burn _ . 

( _ The echo  _ **_SCREAMED_ ** _ at her and there’s a twinge of pain in her chest.) _

Her home wasn’t the village, it wasn’t the orphanage. 

For her, home didn’t exist. 

There was very little to anchor herself to a place once her parents had…  _ once _ her parents had passed away. No roots, her family was scattered, her mother's family from Suna and her fathers were travelling merchants. 

She had the odd acquaintance. 

She had Nue. 

( _ The echo, it flared as if a reminder, even if it was still hot to touch in anger about her disloyalty. Rin rubbed her chest gently as she pursed her lips because the echo was always there _ .)

Apparently, Obito was testing the waters to see if she had room for one more in her sinking ship. 

“Well, apparently, I’m not as lonely as I thought,” Rin said quietly, head tilted and considering. 

Nue stepped forward so they were shoulder to shoulder, arm looping through hers and their fingers threaded together. Locked tightly with a small smile curving her mouth, a familiarity that Obito observed jealousy almost. 

It felt like a dismissal. 

It felt like how the rest of his family treated him, the runt of the litter, _the one to be ignored, to failure,_ to _weak one, the-_

“You can’t keep sneaking up like this though.”

Obito squawked, realising she was talking to him, “I didn’t sneak!”

“Your footsteps were silent!”

“You weren’t paying attention!”

“So you admit that you knew we weren’t paying attention?” Nue cut in with a raised eyebrow. 

Obito’s mouth opened and shut, like a fish, his eyes darting between the two girls who stood in front of him. He wondered if this was about time they’d shoo him away, when they’d kick him out and tell him they didn’t need him lingering about. 

“Wait, did you say  _ keep _ sneaking up?  _ Like _ , I can keep coming over just-”

“Just without scaring us half to death and resulting in possible injuries?” Rin finished with a small smile of her own. “I think it was somewhat implied, yes.”

( _ The echo is warm against her chest. It’s like butterflies and sunshine and some other sappy crap. _ )

“You always gonna be this rude?” Obito asked. 

“You’ll get used to it,” was all Rin offered. 

Obito blinked, lips spreading into a wide grin. 

* * *

  
There was very little which Rin  _ didn’t  _ have an opinion on. 

She thought roses were cliché but also loved the smell, she thought that Matron Saeko was probably a malevolent overlord in another life and that she  _ really fucking hated kunoichi classes _ . 

War was, at that moment, like a knife being balanced. 

It wasn’t clear as to which way it would fall, who would come off better or worse, tension was rife between multiple nations. It was clear that the Academy was trying to churn out as many soldiers as it possibly could in a short amount of time lest the war decided to arrive sooner than expected. 

In Rin’s eyes, the war was already here. 

With the orphanage on the outskirts, when the skirmishes and fights broke out beyond the borders, they trudged past their home or in cases of emergency, their feet slapped again the roof tiles. An orphan, one who’d made themselves into something, one who’d become a medic, Akane complained quietly when she arrived in the early hours for a cup of tea after a long shift. 

Rin closed her eyes, trying to stop the images of flesh being torn, of the blood and the people coming back looking like they’d been mauled. 

Akane was very detailed in her descriptions. 

The only reason which nothing had been publicly declared was so there wouldn’t be mass panic but with the war looming in the back of her head, in the back of Nue’s head, they had little patience for kunoichi classes. 

Objectively, she knew they might’ve been helpful. 

Flowers were a subtle way of sending messages, also a perfectly innocent way to kill someone, to lace the petals with powdered poisons. Tea ceremonies and makeup and clothes, she understood the importance of covert operations…  _ she just wasn’t any good at them _ . 

The only reason she continued to attend, other than Nue’s insistence, was the fact that if she failed and her grades dropped, there was a high chance of getting booted from her placement. 

And she just couldn’t afford that. 

( _ They couldn’t afford that.) _

As much as she  _ objectively _ appreciated what they were teaching, Rin couldn’t help but point out all of their flaws because there was little emphasis on other cultures, the ones they might be sent to emulate. How would they be able to maintain their covers if they couldn’t act like the locals they might’ve been sent to blend in with?

For most of the girls, it seemed like a time for them to get together and  _ gossip _ . 

“Did you know the nectar from an azalea is highly toxic?” Nue hummed in their wander around the fields, looking for plants and flowers to add to their bouquet. 

“Really?”

“Mhm, I heard that the Aburame have developed a  _ mad honey,  _ if they feed their bees on soley azalea’s then they create a honey with hallucinogenic properties,” Nue reached down to pluck a few of the flowers by their stem, adding it to the colourful assortment in her hands. There wasn’t much rhyme or reason to Nue’s bouquet, it was only when you considered her poisonous affinity that you understood the power within her hands. “I’ve heard it can weaken someone over time, slowly and painfully.”

“See,  _ that _ , that’s useful,” Rin grimaced. “I guess flowers can send messages but it’s a bit sappy and vague.”

“I suppose it could be a last resort sort of thing, I prefer to use my flowers like weapons."

Rin paused, reaching down to pick a few cosmos of her own. 

“You’re kind of terrifying,” she informed the other girl. 

“Thank you.”

“But this stuff might be useful for you, it just… doesn’t do anything for me,” Rin finished lamely. 

“These classes aren’t supposed to be for everyone,” Nue shrugged with a faint frown, the two of them sitting down in the grass, indifferent to the other girls wandering around them. “I mean, most of this is pretty rudimentary.”

“Nah, you’re just way too into poisons,” Rin said, throwing a few blades of grass playfully. 

“Here I am, being nice t’you and you’re just mean,” she threw some grass back. “Who else is gonna be nice to you?”

“Uh, everyone? I’m amazing.”

“Mhm,” Nue rolled her eyes. 

“No seriously though, this feels like a waste of time for me,” Rin sighed heavily, letting her spine lax so she flopped out gracefully, sprawled out on the ground and staring at the sky. 

“We have time to waste,” Nue offered quietly, doing the same so they laid side by side. “We might not have a lot of time to spare but, we have time.”

( _ The echo is silent and still, it always is whenever Nue’s around. It has no opinions on the other girl and the echo had an opinion on everything. It was like her friend was a blind spot, something unforeseen and invisible.) _

It seemed like Nue visibly snapped out of a daze, thin lips spreading into a genuine smile as she reached for Rin’s hand. She did it more often these days, without hesitation and Rin would pass it off as something she’d  _ begrudgingly  _ get used to. Her skin tingled though at the contact, affectionate and warm and  _ wanted  _ contact was rare. 

Sometimes, Rin just wanted these moments to last forever, a small grin on her lips. 

“D’you think if I put poison ivy in my bouquet before I gave it to sensei, she’d notice?”

“ _ Rin _ .”

* * *

Obito was a thorn in her side. 

A pest. 

A nuisance. 

Rin had thought it once and she’d probably think it a million times because he was a _ menace _ . A well-meaning and unintentional menace but that’s what he was, forever late and forever smiling, there was always an excuse on hand for his tardiness. 

It was something she was slowly becoming used to but that wasn’t to say that it was pleasant. 

Nue had tried to be the neutral party, she was late herself sometimes after all but that was more to do with the poisons class she’d opted for. It was run by the hospital, something she’d heard about from the matron herself. It was all about looking into the makeup and effect of different poisons on the bodies organs and more specifically, the nervous system. 

There had been stars in Nue’s eyes when she’d described what the class involved as if they were tailor-made for her. 

With the classes becoming more constant though and more intense, it left Rin and Obito alone more often than not for their usual meet up.

Most of the time they trained together. 

They talked and sometimes if Rin had some money left over from her monthly stipend, they’d go out of a treat afterwards. 

In the beginning, it was mostly Obito doing all the talking and she liked to listen. He was so passionate about everything and he brought everything in his stories to life,  _ he made her care about certain things _ , told her about his family. He didn’t ask for her input and left it up to her to try, to make an effort. 

Eventually, she started asking questions, providing her own tidbits,  _ inside jokes _ \- god he had a terrible sense of humour, a little dark and had a tendency to use puns. She laughed more easily, smiled a little easier and though,  _ hey, is this what I’ve been missing out on? _

They sat on a hilltop, sweat cooling in the gentle breeze with their legs stretched out in front of them. Rin had her eyes closed, just for a moment, to bask in the rays of sunshine that slipped through the clouds. 

“After we finish the Academy, where’d you think you’re gonna end up?” Obito asked. 

“Hm?”

“I think I’ll probably end up on the Police Force,” Obito said with a decisive edge. She could imagine him nodding, no doubt knocking his goggles askew again. She didn’t understand why he insisted on wearing them, they were kinda ridiculous. 

He loved talking about his family though, his Clan. Even when it was a little obvious that some didn’t treat him as well as they should. 

It didn’t diminish the love which he had for them. His tardiness was usually down to them;  _ I had to help my Aunt with her shopping, my cousin fell and hurt his leg, I was trying to find my Uncles missing cat _ . 

He clapped his hands together gleefully, “Maybe I’ll become an investigator!”

“Obito, you couldn’t investigate your way out of a cardboard box,” as harsh as it may seem, Rin couldn’t stop the small laugh that slipped past her mouth, knowing that he was grinning right back at her. 

“Could so!”

“You couldn’t even find out who ate your bento last week.”

“It’s still an open case,” he insisted, cheeks flushing. 

“Is one of the suspects  _ you _ ?” cracking an eye open, she couldn’t help but cackle at the heavy blush that reached the tips of his ears. 

“I can neither confirm nor deny details of an ongoing ca-  _ hey _ !” Rin scoffed, shoving him off to the side with an incredulous groan, laughing at his faint yelp. He spluttered indignantly as he sat upright again. “Okay then, what’re  _ you _ gonna end up doing?”

She shrugged. 

“Dunno,” plain and simple. “We’re gonna end up on a team for a while…”  _ go to war _ “- and then after that, I have no clue.”

“None at all?” Obito seemed puzzled by the thought. “But you usually have everything planned out.”

“Nah, I have contingencies if things go  _ horribly horribly  _ wrong,” there was a pointed look that made Obito splutter indignantly. “But most of the time I’m winging it.”

“Huh, never would’a guessed.”

“I used to want to be a doctor, not a medic or anything with chakra, this was before all that,” Rin told him, both eyes open as she stared at the skies. A knot forming in her chest. “My- ...my dad was always getting hurt, I think he was just clumsy. Always came back with these bandages and casts and stitched up.”

“What did he do?”

“Construction mainly, whatever jobs he could get,” it was hard to think back, she spent so little time with them. “I can’t remember him very well but whenever he had a new injury I made him sit down so I could wrap him in  _ special bandages _ . Ones which Tsunade herself used, supposed to heal anything.”

“Yeah?” Obito was grinning from cheek to cheek. 

“It was just toilet roll.”

The two of them sniggered.

“My mum worked in this woodshop that used to be down by the bakery-”

“The one opposite the dango stall or the one near my place?”

“Dango stall, she used to take me there every now and then when she had some work to do, I think it kept me quiet for a little while as she tried to get things done,” there wasn’t a lot she could remember about either of her parents, they were smudges in her memories. Happy smudges but they were somewhat indistinguishable.

“As cute as the idea of you bein’ a lil’ doctor for your dad is, I don’t think you could be a medic,” Obito told her casually, arms now folded behind his head as he reclined lazily. “You don’t really have the patience for it.”

Rin squawked. 

“I deal with you every day!”

“You  _ hit _ me at least twice a day.”

“Okay… not a medic… I’m not really interested in getting too high in the ranks either,”  _ ANBU  _ went unspoken but they both knew what she meant. “Maybe teaching?”

Obito snorted until he realised she was being serious. 

“You realise you can’t hit the kids?” 

“Not even the annoying ones?”

“ **_Especially_ ** the annoying ones.”

“...Maybe that can be a backup then,” she huffed, folding her arms over her chest. “Why so interested anyway?”

Obito shrugged. 

“I guess I just got thinking, I mean, it's not like we’re not gonna be in the Academy forever,” he said quietly. “My family is pretty big and it’s easy to get lost in the crowd. I just hope that when we graduate that things get . . .” 

He struggled to find the word but Rin smiled, genuinely as she nudged him. 

“It’ll get better,” she promised him. 

“Yeah?”

“Well, it’ll get  _ worse  _ first,” Rin told him bluntly, laughing as his expression comically dropped. 

“You are the absolute  _ worst _ at pep talks!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays people! New years is so close!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Hokage had assigned him a student. 
> 
> Hatake Kakashi, to be exact. 
> 
> Minato had no idea how to feel about that.

_ “Do you understand your mission?” _

_ “Yes.” _

_ “You understand the consequences if you fail.” _

_ “Yes.” _

_ “Good, I expect a weekly report, as per usual, now onto the matters in Kumo -” _

* * *

 

The Hokage had assigned him a student. 

Hatake Kakashi, to be exact. 

Minato had no idea how to feel about that. 

The death of the White Fang of Konoha was still at the forefront of everyone’s minds, the mission he’d failed and what it had cost Konoha. Their insults were sharp knives and they were willing to throw them at anything remotely close to their source of ire. 

Minato couldn’t change  _ everyone’s  _ minds but most of his friends were steadfast in their support of Sakumo and the decisions he made, the few which weren’t? It wasn’t that huge of a loss. It still didn’t seem like enough when his son was forced the bear the brunt of the  _ ‘shame’ _ which his father had brought upon their village. 

If he was any less composed, he might’ve stood on one of the empty crates in the market and told all the ungrateful civilians where they could shove it. 

Alas, he’d leave that to  _ Kushina _ . 

He’d admit, before, when he was a child, the mantle of Hokage seemed the be all and end all. It was something that was getting closer and closer within his grasp but the need had abated, the breathlessness at the idea of it had passed. He knew it was a bigger responsibility than his seven-year-old self could have ever imagined. 

So he’d wanted to start small,  _ a team _ , a small genin team of his own.    
  
The campfires he’d had with his own teacher, with Kino and Jin. His teammates had gone on to do bigger and better things, they’d lost touch but he treasured the time they’d had together and he always would. Their team picture still on his windowsill alongside the other frames, all of them were important moments in his life. 

He just hadn’t expected to take one with an angry Hatake Kakashi. 

Maybe it was a test? 

Sarutobi  _ loved _ his tests, passing it down to Jiraiya-sensei and maybe to himself one day.    
  
“I’m not giving up on him,” Minato said and it was a promise. 

Kushina considered the young boy's picture, plucking it out of the file which Minato’d been reading from. It was all of his scores from the Academy, the comments from his teacher, from the therapist he went to for about a month after… after the passing of Sakumo. They all said how well-adjusted he was, how quiet and polite and well-behaved. 

Surprisingly, despite the snide comments about his heritage, they had nothing bad to say about the boy himself. 

“Maybe he’s like a rescue dog, angry, abused and I don’t think he actually knows how to react t’you genuinely being nice to him… without any other agenda  _ other than _ being nice to him.”   
  
"I guess he'll just have to get used to it," he shrugged.   
  
Easier said than done.

Somewhere, wherever his sensei was, he was laughing. He found himself thinking about his time with their genin team more often these days. Minato wondered if they gave Jiraiya-sensei this many heart attacks or if Kakashi was just special that way? He almost wanted to send a toad with a heartfelt apology for whatever they’d put him through back in the day.    
  
“It was completely,  _ completely _ irresponsible,” he was scolding, he never scolded. It wasn’t something he enjoyed doing but then again, it’d be something he’d have to get used to. Minato felt like the Matron that was back in the orphanage he’d been in and a shudder ran down his spine at the mere thought of the woman. 

Kakashi sat on the hospital bed, he was bandaged and bruised and completely apathetic his concerns. 

“The healer said you’d worked yourself to exhaustion, and if the patrol team hadn’t found you when they did- then,  _ then- _ ”

Minato threw his hands up because it felt like he was banging his head against a brick wall sometimes. His hands quickly found the bridge of his nose, pinching it  _ just so _ as he shut his eyes so he didn’t have to look at his student. His  _ first  _ student.    
  
"Kakashi, I can't keep doing this," he said quietly, they’d only been lumped together for a few months but he felt like he’d aged years. Kakashi was always training, he was always trying to improve, to overcome the obstacles which his father had unknowingly placed in front of him. 

He was alone, from dawn till dusk. 

It was something which Minato didn’t know how-  _ if _ -he was able to help. 

With his eyes shut, Minato missed Kakashi’s sharp gaze lifting to stare at his new teacher. The man supposed to guide him from genin to the great beyond. His eyes lowering to his knees and his fists clenching the stiff sheets on the hospital bed, the metal creaking ever so slightly.    
  


" _ I just _ \- I don't know how to help you here, kid," he murmured. "I don't know what you need from me and I can't keep watching you tear yourself apart like this."   
  
"Then don't watch," Kakashi said bluntly.

“Don’t ask that of me, you  _ know _ that I care too much, that I’m going to watch and I’m going to catch you if you fall. Right there, if you need me.”   
  
"What if I never need you?"   
  
"Then I'll still be there," Minato snapped. 

It was the first time,  _ what felt like the first time _ , which he’d really been firm with the boy because as much as Kakashi liked to preach about following the rules; as much as he went on and on about following the shinobi code, he was just a boy looking for  _ something _ to follow. Before, that had been Sakumo and his father hadn’t led him wrong. When, … when Sakumo took his own life, part of Kakashi faded with him,  _ faded _ but not truly gone. 

“I’ll still be there whether you like it or not, to be a shinobi means having each other back. That means I’m there to help, to help you grow but right now? Right now, you're just letting yourself  _ burn _ ,” he dropped the hand away from his face, eyes open so he could look at his student. His eyes flint and maybe it borders on a glare. 

The silence is heavy and thick, weighted with all the things unsaid. Maybe Minato had gone too far,  _ maybe _ -   
  
"Alright, Hatake-san!" The chipper doctor called out before barging into the room. There was a plastic quality to her smile that all doctors wore when dealing with unruly patients, she stopped short when realising there was someone else in the room. "Ah! Namikaze-san, I didn't realise you were visiting."   
  
"My student’s in the hospital, Miyano-san," he murmured with a smile of his own, probably as plastic and as strained as the doctor. She looked a little frazzled and if all her patients were as difficult as his student, then he didn't blame her. His eyes sliding over to stare at Kakashi meaningfully. "Of course I'm going to check up on him."   
  
Kakashi stared at the floor as if it was the most interesting thing in the world.   
  
"Well, he's good to go, take it easy today and tomorrow though," Miyano-san offered after an awkward pause, handing the papers over to Minato for him to sign Kakashi out. From the way his student eyed his surroundings, he doubted that Kakashi would make an effort to come back there.   
  
Signing with a flourish, they left quickly.   
  
It could’ve just ended there, he could’ve just let it all go.

Just as Kakashi turned to head back to his home,  _ a home full of ghosts, a home where he’d lost both his mother and father _ , Minato’s hand slammed down on his shoulder in a vice-like grip. 

His smile might have been bright but there was a twitch to his mouth and a decision already made because his revenge was going to be  _ sweet _ .    
  
"Oh, no no no, Kakashi-kun!" Oh, he was going to enjoy this.  "You're going to be staying in my guest room tonight, so I  _ know  _ you're taking it easy."   
  
It took them ten minutes to have an overnight bag packed and at his door, Kushina already waiting to greet them. 

“Welcome,  _ brat _ ,” she greeted with the same kind of vicious grin that she graced her enemies with. She bent at the waist so that she could be eye-to-eye with him but because of her lack of regard for personal space, they were almost nose to nose. “So you’re the one giving Minato a hard time?”

She may have posed it as a question but it felt like a warning.    
  
Honestly, Minato was going to marry this woman.   
  
"Eh, probably for the best, he needs someone to keep him on his toes," Kushina shrugged as she stood back to her full height. "C'mon, I'll make you some food."   


Minato’s jubilant expression sunk into a frown as they walked into the flat. 

Leaving him standing in the open doorway, somewhat confused.    
  
_ That wasn't how he'd expected it to go. _

* * *

 

“You’re late,” she reached around and clipped his ear sharply. “ _ Again _ .”   


“Yeah yeah,  _ sorry _ .”

Nue had stuck around for as long as she could, hoping to at least see Obito before running off to her classes. The hospital had such glowing reviews about their students progress that they’d continued with them after a couple of weeks and Nue had raved about wanting to carry on her studies within the hospital. 

As much as Rin hated that it took up a lot of her free time, she couldn’t stay mad when she saw how happy,  _ how excited _ , it made Nue. 

It just meant that they were down to two for the past couple of weeks. 

Over the weeks Rin liked to think she had a better grasp on the whole -  _ being friends _ sort of thing. Obito was loud and proud and so silly, which was why she knew that something wasn’t quite right with his lacklustre reply. 

“You okay?” Rin asked awkwardly, not sure when she was stepping over a line. Obito sat across from her. “You look kinda…” she gestured to her own face, unable to put it into words. “ _ Serious? _ Like, the bento incident kind of serious.”

She threw it in as a joke but he didn’t even rise to the bait. 

Usually, he’d wave his arms, so dramatically and threatening bodily harm to innocent bystanders, disputing his amazing investigatory prowess. It just wasn’t right that he sat there, staring at the small boxes of food which she’d brought as a present. Well, technically it was a present from the cook, Senzo, in the orphanage, who’d been in a charitable mood. 

He sat there, twiddling his fingers and refusing to look her in the eyes until she finally grabbed her chopsticks. Breaking them in half, she clicked them at him sharply, waving them as if they were cleanly sharpened sebon. Obito flinched away from the offending sticks, brow pulled together as he dodged the swift jab she aimed at his side. 

“C’mon Obito.”

“The Clan doesn’t really…” Obito sighed, rubbing the back of his neck with a faint blush. Something which made Rin pause. “They don’t really like… us, hanging out.”

Oh. 

_ Oh _ . 

That made sense. 

“Okay,” Rin shrugged, it was no dirt of her nose. 

Most Clan’s employed a similar policy but that was more aimed towards their heirs and heiresses. A lot of orphans tried to get chummy with children from Clans, it was a way of trying to gain some kind of favour or bolster their own reputation or try to plant the seeds for an early romance and marriage.

It was a smart way to do it but these days, Clan’s were getting wise to the tricks of the trade. 

That wasn’t to say all of those sorts of friendships were based on that sort of thing. The academy had limited places for orphans each year and that limited who you could be friends with. 

She took it as a dismissal. 

( _ The echo ached ached  _ **_ached_ ** _.) _

With a small smile, as wobbly as it might’ve felt despite telling her  _ it’s fine! What did you expect?  _ She started to stand up, brushing the dirt off her pants and starting to gather her own bento, leaving Obito with his. She wasn’t heartless, she wasn’t gonna take his food away from him, not when Senzo had made it for him. 

“W-where are you going?” Obito sputtered.

Which was when Rin got really confused,  _ hadn’t he just said-? _

“Your Clan doesn’t like us hanging out…?” She murmured, brow pulled together, her hands on her knees as she stared down at him.

“So y-your just gonna leave?”  _ Wasn’t that why he’d said-? _

“...well,  _ yeah _ , otherwise you’re gonna get in trouble, aren’t you?” Rin said slowly, nodding along with her own words as if it would help them both keep up with that line of thought. Obito’s face, dark and gloomy and a touch heartbroken, brightened and she tried to stop her breath from hitching - it was literally like the sun coming out from behind the clouds.

“That just means we’re gonna have to be sneaky ‘bout it!” 

He might’ve had a smile that was like sunshine but,  _ boy _ , he was an idiot. 

He was lucky she liked him.

( _ That we liked him, the echo reminded with a giggle _ .)

(Me, Rin insisted.  _ Me me  _ **_me!_ ** _ Not we, never we!) _

“And how’d you suppose we keep it a secret?” Rin asked and maybe it was a little patronising but he was grinning, they both were as she took her seat again. 

Obito’s grin grew, from cheek to cheek and she could  _ hear _ Nue’s groan from wherever she was in Konoha at that moment because a grin like that spelt out trouble. It  _ stank _ of a bad idea. On a scale of  _ Nue’s _ sort of bad ideas to  _ Rin’s _ bad ideas, Obito’s was usually their halfway point, the middle ground which didn’t mean they were any better. 

“I’ve got a plan!”

“ _ Here we go,” _ Rin griped. 

“Hey! It’s a good plan!”

“I’ve heard  _ that _ before.”

“I swear, this time-”

“Heard that before too,” Rin practically sang, masking her small smile by popping a piece of fruit into her mouth. 

“Would you just listen?” 

He rolled his eyes and laughed when Rin gave a dramatic flourish of her hands as if to say ‘ _ After you maestro! _ ’. 

“Right! Okay, so they can’t separate us if we’re in the same class and-”

His mouth was moving and the words were spilling out, a mile a minute and Rin, she just nodded along but he knew she wasn’t really listening. Her mind was elsewhere, wondering where and what Nue was doing at that exact moment, wondering what they’d be doing in the Academy next week and maybe even wondering if she could afford to buy the set of knives they’d spotted in the weapons store a few days ago. 

Whatever plan Obito was proposing was probably far-fetched and doomed to fail from the very beginning. 

“You’re not listening,” Obito deadpanned. 

He received no answer, didn’t expect one really. 

Rin sometimes got that glassy look to her, like she was in this world of her own. She might’ve looked a little scary, she was sometimes cold and distant but from appearance along she seemed fragile and soft. She had these big brown eyes that looked like amber when the sun hit them just right, had dark hair that seemed to be getting a little too long for her liking. 

Obito’s head tilted as he considered her. 

She was a good friend, had a mean sort of humour and insulted him without any real malice, _she was a_ _ terrible person sometimes _ , but she was a good friend. 

“Y’know, I don’t know why you hang out with me?” Obito said quietly. 

Rin hummed in agreement before realising what it was that he’d actually said, he hid his smile behind a hand as the illusion of vulnerability was washed away. Her brow pulling into a fierce scowl as she turned to glare at him. 

That was the Rin he was used to. 

“What the fuck d’you mean by that?”

He rolled his eyes. 

“You know that m’not the best Uchiha around,” he grumbled. 

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know that was what I was looking for.”

“Rin,  _ be serious _ ,” he whined. 

“I am, Obito,” honest, Rin zoned out for, what,  _ five minutes? _ And this is what she came back down to earth to? 

The wrinkle between her eyebrows smoothed out when she saw how earnest his expression was and how much this affected him. She didn’t realise this was something he thought about though. How was she to know? Still, shuffling a bit closer on her knees, she poked him in the chest,  _ hard _ , hard enough for it to hurt. 

( _ Good, the echo agreed firmly, idiot boy _ .)

(Rin didn’t even bother trying to ignore the echo because it was right,  _ idiot boy _ .)

“I’m not friends with you because you’re the best Shinobi around, if I wanted that I would’a made friends with Hatake when he was in our class for a  _ day _ . I’m friends with you-”

Obito lit up, turning to look at her with his big dark eyes. 

“-because you forced me to be your friend.”

Slumping down once more, the light snuffed and he just pouted, sulky and grumpy even as Rin laughed. It was a nice laugh too, a proper one because he’d heard her cackle and it was usually at his expense. He’d heard her fake-laugh, she was really bad at it, it was always awkward and prompted a quick escape. 

“Obito,” she said and this time when he looked at her, she smiled and he felt warm from head to toe. “I like you because you’re stubborn, you’re persistent and because you genuinely care about a lot of people.”

( _ The echo is warm and Rin acknowledges the warmth isn’t invasive, it sits upon her breastbone, slowly simmering just under the surface _ .)

“You actually want to help  _ everyone _ and it doesn’t matter whether they’re Uchiha or not, whether they’re from a Clan or not,” she reached over and ruffled his hair, dislodging his goggles so that they swung around his neck. “Y’might be an Uchiha, you might not activate your Sharingan and I wouldn’t really care, as long as you keep being you.”

( _ The echo aches and there’s something she doesn’t know, that Rin doesn’t realise that the echo knows. It aches and aches and  _ **_aches._ ** )

“I give it a five out of ten for a pep talk,” Obito eventually grunted out, swiping at his eyes with a suspicious sniffle. 

“Are you crying?” Rin laughed. 

Obito scoffed even as the tears kept on coming. “No! You just bored me to tears!”

“Last time I do that mushy sort’a stuff for you!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Years guys! Also after the next chapter, things are gonna slow down with updates, mainly because I've had them posted on fanfiction.net for a while. I've been editing them and posting them up here as well as amending them over there.


	6. Chapter 6

“Rin-chan!” 

Minato looked jubilant at their crossing of paths, hand immediately clamping down on Kakashi’s shoulder lest he tried to escape in the confusion. He dragged him towards the other girl, paying Kakashi no mind as he struggled and dug his heels in, already ticked off and irritable from their training earlier that day. 

Minato remembered Rin… a lot  _ smaller _ . 

Granted they’d met once,  _ maybe twice _ , and very little had been said. 

A lot of his decision to sponsor her application was out of a sense of guilt. That wasn’t to say he regretted it, just… regretted not doing something to help the kids in a similar situation as himself sooner. He remembered all too well the clamour of Academy day, of the wait to know whether they’d be going to the Academy or if their dreams were well and truly over. He’d watched the small girl snatch the money from the vendor with the same ease that he had after years of practice, remember how panicked she’d looked.

“Namikaze-san,” she greeted him with a small smile. 

“You've gotten so tall,” he found himself saying without really meaning to, lips pursed and he tried to remember how long it’d been, how long she’d been in the Academy for because he’d  _ checked _ his application, made sure she was on that register. 

“...thank you?” 

Rin glanced at Kakashi, the boy who’d been her classmate for a hot minute. 

As grumpy and frustrated as his student seemed to be, they shared a common-enemy of sorts at that point, so he shrugged his shoulders, dislodging his teacher's hand, silently and stoically telling her to  _ go with the flow _ in his own way.

“How’s the Academy treating you?” He was interested in hearing all about it, the shine of his Academy days had long since faded. There was almost a nostalgic glow about it now. 

_ Boring, dull, rushed. _

Those were the words which instantly sprung to mind but Rin, staring up at the man who was probably the  _ only _ reason she’d made it  _ to _ the Academy, forced her tongue to flatten in her mouth. It wasn’t polite to discredit their villages teachings and their teachers. 

“I found some cheap apples,” Nue cut in. 

_ Rin could’ve kissed her _ . 

Minato’s eyes flicked over to the other girl which accompanied his sponsee, eyes flicking over the sort of bedraggled clothing, well-worn and full of pulled threads. The thick holster which was a size too big and standard issue usually provided in the care package of acceptance to the Academy. A friend from the orphanage. 

Nue’s nose wrinkled, not really acknowledging the two strangers. “They’re a bit bruised but we can probably cut those parts off.”

“I don’t even **like** apples.”

“Well, tough, y’need to eat more fruit,” Minato masked his smile behind a hand, pretending to scratch his cheek and feeling the nostalgia all over again from his own team.  _ He wondered how they were doing _ . Nue’s eyes eventually swivelled around. “Oh.”

“And you made friends,” Minato pointed out with an amused hum, the other girl grinning in agreement. 

Rin just frowned,  _ she could make friends,  _ why did people assume she couldn’t make friends?

“This is Nue.”

“Do we really need this many dorayaki’s?” 

_ Of course, Obito chose that moment to slide in.  _

Minato watched their rag-tag group come together and felt a pang go out to his own student, Kakashi having taken a step back at the congregation of what could’ve been his classmates. It was very clear that he didn’t have a lot of friends his own age if any at all. Gai was one of the few which pestered him out of training. 

“Uh, Rin? You know these people?” Obito asked, trying to be subtle and muttering it out of the corner of his mouth but sometimes Obito was as subtle as a shinobi dressed in orange. 

“Obito, this is Namikaze Minato, he was the one who sponsored my application.”

The three of them stared up at him with various expressions, Nue was more interested in the kunai hung around his hip, one of his three-pronged ones that he always kept on hand. At least, the only visible one. Obito, on the other hand, looked a little starstruck and it was something which Minato was a little uncomfortable with. Rin, however, was unimpressed, her own lips pursed and arms folded across her chest. 

“We’re old friends,” Minato insisted. 

“No we’re not,” Rin immediately shot it down with a roll of her eyes,  _ she seemed to do that a lot _ . 

Minato dreaded the day Kushina would get wind of her, she’d already happily taken Kakashi in and encouraged his troublesome ways,  _ he was spending too much time with Shikaku.  _ If she got her mind set on Rin and her friends? A shiver of dread crept down his spine. 

“This is my student, Kakashi,” Minato introduced, hoping to steer his mind away from the  _ disastrous _ consequences that were accumulating in his head. “Kakashi, this is Rin.”

The two stared at one another blankly for a moment. 

“We were in the same class for a day before you advanced.”

“...Nice to meet you.”

It was pointless and tense and they were dismissive of one another right off of the bat. Kakashi was a year or so younger than them and already graduated. They didn’t know each other and that line of conversation was snuffed so quickly that Minato scrambled for another way to keep the conversation going rather than head over to the tower to finish up the mission report from yesterday. 

“You never answered my question, how’s the Academy going?”

( _ The echo is a warm and soft glow by this point, from fingertips to toes and Rin feels like she’s floating _ .)

“It’s going,” was all she managed. 

“Rin’s doing well,” Nue was happy to provide. 

“We all are,” Obito quickly amended, grinning widely from cheek to cheek as he adjusted the goggles on top of his head, making sure he didn’t drop the bag of dorayaki. “This week we’re finally sparring!”

“Ah, really?” the jōnin hummed thoughtfully. “Have you been working on your taijutsu?”

“Hell yeah!” Obito immediately crumpled after his excited exclamation, clutching his ribs and staggering off to the side a little with a whimper. “ _ Rin _ .”

“Don’t shout in my ear then,” she grumbled, fingers pressed against tragus, trying to stop the ringing. “I think everyone in Suna heard you.”

“We’ve been working hard, Namikaze-san,” Nue offered with a small placid smile that seemed well practised, like the art of ignoring her bickering friends. It didn’t seem like there was a flaw in her mask, she didn’t twitch or have a tell. Either she was very good at hiding her annoyance or she was, unfortunately, completely used to her friends antics to even be annoyed in the first place.

Kakashi’s eyes slid over to the two of them, they were bickering and sniping. 

“It wasn’t that loud! You’re being dramatic!”

“Hah, says the Drama Queen himself!”

“I am the  _ least _ dramatic person in the whole of Konoha!” 

Kakashi’s nose wrinkled at their unprofessional behaviour, gaze sliding back to the other girl,  _ Nao? Nami?  _ He hadn’t been paying attention when the brief introductions were made, didn’t see the point in it. They were on a deadline to finish the mission report within their allotted time of return. 

“My condolences,” he offered,  _ sorry your friends are idiots _ , indifferent to his sensei’s gentle reprimand at his comment.

“Excuse me?” it didn’t have the desired effect, the girl's eyes narrowed into slits and her lip curling ever so slightly at the insult. 

“Mah, Rin, you’ve such a way with people,” Obito drawled with a grin, dancing out of her reach when she tried to elbow him again and effectively, slipping out of their petty argument and into the tension between Kakashi and Nue. His grin falling away when Kakashi scoffed quietly under his breath and Minato knew when to take his leave before things escalated. 

“Well!” He clapped his hands together, wondering when it had slowly started to crash-and-burn. “It’s been nice seeing you again, Rin! You should come over for dinner with us at some point, d’you like ramen?”

“I suppose.”

“Great, we’ve gotta run, mission reports and all that but I’ll see you soon!”

The three of them stood there, staring at the empty spot Minato had been stood with his student. All that was left was a cloud of smoke, the three of them watching, eyes twitching. 

“Is he always that weird?” Nue asked, voice strained. 

* * *

Sota-sensei was notorious. 

He taught the older children, had been provided a teaching assistant which was just a nice way of putting that he was being observed for his ...questionable teaching methods. With his grin wide and assistant missing, there wasn’t a doubt in Rin’s mind that today was going to be chock full of bad ideas. 

He clapped his hands twice before rubbing them gleefully. 

“Okay, you all know the rules!”

There was a slight pause as they glanced between themselves because all they’d been told was that sparring practice was about to begin. There’d been no mention of rules  _ whatsoever _ . 

Sato-sensei beamed like a child in a candy shop, “There are none!”

A lot of them had commented on how unexpected the whole thing was, to be thrown into the deep end with no warning, they hadn’t even stretched. They stood in a huddle, each tenser than the other. Then again, how else would they be able to gauge their skills before they start to mould them into the perfect soldiers for their war?

“This ain’t just a taijutsu match, weapons are allowed, anything allowed  _ really _ ,” the teacher muttered, staring off in the general direction of their usual classroom and for a second Rin wondered if Naoko-sensei knew what was going on but she didn’t have time to think about that. 

Rin eyed her potential opponents. 

She hadn’t made many friends in her class, they were all acquaintances to an extent, had to be when they were partnered up at random by Naoko-sensei. They were all comrades but they weren’t friends, and there wouldn’t be out on the battlefield. With a somewhat strained detachment,  _ it used to be a lot easier to take a step back _ , she looked her opposition. 

Nue?  _ Poisons _ , weak upper body strength, preferred sebon to kunai. 

Kurenai? Genjutsu, long distance. 

Asuma was a brawler. 

Obito?

Her mind stuttered to a halt. 

( _ The echo thrummed _ .)

Instinctively? She just dismissed him and that was terrible to say but in Rin’s eyes, it was almost like she refused to see him as a threat. The echo’s hum was so strong and angry in her chest but it faded too quickly before it could leave in an impression. Even if it did leave her dizzy for a few seconds. 

Her eyes met Nue’s halfway because they were both doing the same thing. 

Nue smiled widely, showing the gap between her front two teeth. 

_ A silent agreement _ , there’d be no hard feelings if they ended up against one another. Out of all of their classmates, the ones of placements were the ones who knew how to  _ really _ fight dirty. They didn’t understand the honour in a spar because winning was surviving. 

They were ruthless, down in the mud and the blood, scratching and scrapping and surviving. 

Being on the other side of Konoha, the unwanted?  _ Yeah _ , that took its toll.

The Clan’s had their own ways of fighting but most stuck to some sort of semblance of honour which the placements, which the orphans, the unwanted never got taught because they didn’t have the families to teach them. Rin bit her lip as she counted the heads in her class. 

“Get in a circle, all of you,” Sota-sensei demanded. 

They did as they were told, their teacher watching with a small smile, no doubt ready to enjoy the show. To watch his least favourite students beat the ever loving shit out of one another. Rin was pretty sure that if it had been allowed, he’d have made some refreshments and pulled out a comfy seat to watch the whole thing. As if it was all fun and games.  

_ It probably was to him _ . 

( _ The echo flinched _ .)

The crowd shifted, moving so they surrounded the crudely drawn-out circle which they’d eventually be pitted against one another in. It was far away from the classrooms so their brawls wouldn’t distract the other classes from their work. 

A bony shoulder rams into hers as Rin tries to get a  better spot. 

“Watch where you’re going,” a girl sneered, the tag-along which followed the two Uchiha girls that Nue’d dealt with previously. Rin honestly couldn’t remember her name, she was unimportant. She simply stared back, vacant and uncaring as the other girls back up, the two Uchiha girls sniggering behind their hands, smirking as their friend joined them. 

There was no point reacting, they wouldn’t do anything whilst the teacher was watching them like a hawk. No doubt waiting for one of them to slip up before the spars even started. 

When they were one on one in the ring?  _ That was a different matter entirely _ . 

“I was gonna make it random and put all y’names in a hat to keep things fair,” the teacher called out and Rin met Nue’s gaze, trying not to smile when the other girl rolled her eyes so hard that Rin thought they might pop out of her head.  _ Look underneath the underneath _ , all that shit, nothing was that easy. “But let’s be real, nothing's fair and your matchups were chosen a few days ago.”

A few of her classmates exchanged uneasy looks, swaying unsurely. 

Rin noted that they were mostly overly-coddled Clan children. 

The first couple of fights were pathetic, Rin would be upfront about that. They were civilian first generation against a Clan child. Which included the girl who’d sneered at her earlier. The civilian-born was hopelessly outmatched and combined with the nerves of going first? It just unnerved everyone further. 

Which was probably the point. 

Sato-sensei looked quite at home, smiling as he made notes as the matches progressed. She didn’t know whether he was actually paying attention or monitoring them as well as writing up their assessments. 

“Nue versus Ginjiro,”  _ orphan against orphan. _

There were instant reactions. 

Some, Clan children mainly, looked bored. A main branch Hyuuga actually scoffed aloud before physically turning away from the matchup. 

Obito was straining himself against the circle, trying to get the best view whilst Rin straightened out of interest. Her eyes flicking between the opponents with logical, cold interest. 

Nue was going to win. 

As great as Nue was, it wasn’t really a soft-hearted testament of belief she had in her friend's abilities. 

Looking at it from an outsider's perspective, Ginjiro was all about brute strength, his chakra control was shit and he tended to dive head first into things without thinking them through. A beserker and with some training, a damn good one. Against someone like Nue who was nimble and relied heavily on strategies? It wasn’t an even match up, especially if Nue cracked out any poisons. 

After all, the teacher did say,  _ no rules _ .

“Alright,  _ go _ ,” the teacher said with a lazy wave of his hand. 

Ginjiro, in true form, threw himself at Nue with a right hook that was easily blocked. 

He was almost making this too easy, leaving himself open so Nue rammed her knee into his chest, winding him as well as sending him skidding a few feet away from her. It just seemed to spark something and he launched his next attack,  _ and then another, and another,  _ **_and another_ ** . 

From the outside, Rin found it almost comical.

Nue dodged every attack with the same bored expression, calmly moving an inch or so, barely breaking a sweat. And with every missed attack, Ginjiro became more and more enraged.

Now the Clan children only watched to point and laugh.  _ Fucking maggots. _

As ferociously as it started, it ended just as suddenly when Nue used an opening to crash her elbow into the back of his head. Using her weight against him to pin him to the ground, face first and just to make sure? 

Four sebon needles in his shirt, literally pinning him to the ground. 

“Yeah,” Sato-sensei muttered, scratching the back of his head and sounding vaguely amused. “I think that counts as a win.”

He ignored Ginjiro’s snarl of frustration, only stepping into the ring to pluck the needles out of the ground, he handed them back to Nue with a raised eyebrow before following procedure and forced the two of them to make the seal of reconciliation. 

Reconciliation? 

It wasn’t over if the sour looks which Ginjiro aimed at Nue were anything to go by. 

Kurenai was next, narrowly winning with a well-timed and executed genjutsu that had the other girl almost pulling her hair out. Asuma lost to Gai, whose enthusiasm put them all to shame but he seemed nice enough otherwise. The two of them laughing and slapping one another’s backs as they left the circle. 

It lulled her into a false sense of security. 

“Sana versus Rin,” the teacher called out. 

It threw her a little off balance. 

Eyes narrowed, focused, Rin watched the other girl saunter into the ring. 

Inuzuka Sana, to be honest, she knew little about the girl. 

She didn’t know a lot of her classmates personally but that wasn’t the point. 

She knew was that this was one of the girls Nue’d had trouble with previously. Sana was an Inuzuka, though that was loosely used since she hadn’t received a ninken just yet, enough for her to be considered a little rough around the edges  _ and  _ for her to consider herself better than some in their class. 

A few scoffed at the  _ obviously _ uneven match-up before the fight had even begun.

Sana strolled into the ring like she owned it, her grin wide and her hands shoved into her pockets, like she didn’t have a car in the world. In fact, the way she was acting? She looked like she’d already  _ won _ and Rin silently seethed at that. 

“Well?” She drawled.

Rin quickly stepping into the circle when she realised she hadn’t actually moved from her spot, Obito and Nue watching her like a hawk. Obito gnawing at his fingernails in obvious concern.

“Let's make this interesting, huh?” Sana offered and maybe Rin would have overlooked it, ignored the patronising way she spoke, been the bigger person. Then again, she was in the wrong profession if she wasn’t going to solve things with her fists. 

The teachers  _ go ahead _ was barely heard and Sana lunged. 

Dodging, blow after blow, Rin tried to recall everything she could about her classmate. Her mother was Inuzuka, passed away, virtually a Clan orphan since her civilian father didn’t want anything to do with her. The gossip got around, whether you wanted it to or not. 

She didn’t have a canine companion but she did have some Clan training. 

Eventually tiring of dodging, Rin threw a kick to her waist only for Sana to grab her ankle, physically catching her and using her momentum to throw her away. Rin grappled with the floor, skidding to try to stop herself from crashing into her classmates but she couldn’t catch her breath. 

Sana was already there, fists flying and Rin was back on the defensive. 

The only opening she could see at the time-

Rin _headbutted_ her. 

The other girl reeled back but Rin took the opportunity, slamming her shoulder into the girl's chest and knocking her off her feet. From there on, it was the two of them scrapping, scratching and snarling at each other and Rin didn’t care how she looked. All she had was the war drums slamming a heavy tempo in her skull and the whisper of her echo in the back of her head. 

A fist full of dirt flew into her eyes. 

She spluttered but didn’t have enough time to recover- one small distraction and it felt like game over. 

Gravity failed her and she was flipped over like she was weightless. Her back slamming into the ground and suddenly, the girl was crouched over her on all fours. She might’ve made a joke about it, something about Inuzuka’s because Sana’s face curled into a snarl with a glint in her eyes that told her that Rin was going to regret this. 

Obito was forced to watch, he couldn’t see their faces. All he could see was Sana’s back, crouched over his friend. 

He didn’t see the way her arm dug into her _breastbone_. The way it slid down and locked her forearm _over her throat._

Air became a commodity in those seconds and Rin struggled. She flailed and kicked and tried to throw her off,  _ she just needed the arm off her neck.  _

Her forearm is over Rin’s windpipe now and she knows people are shuffling, slightly unsettled with how things have turned. As black spots began to dance in front of her eyes, she could’ve sworn she saw her teacher finally get up to intervene.

_ Fuck this _ , a voice snarled and she wasn’t sure if it was herself or the other girl who cursed. 

She flattened her chin to her neck, wriggling and writhing enough to jostle the arm, to make enough room to slide her chin under the girl's forearm,  _ moving it just so _ , so that she could-

“You bit me!” 

The girl screeched, reeling back and grunting loudly when Rin lifted her legs, planting both of them in her chest to kick Sana off of her. 

Rin had  _ so _ many regrets, spitting and coughing, trying to get rid of the taste-  _ god _ , it was rank. Like dirt, sweat and  _ just more dirt _ . There was a ring of teeth marks around the other girl's arm, the bruises were already blooming but it wasn’t over. Not yet 

Her classmates were whispering as she stood up. 

“No rules,” Rin reminded her. 

Sana dodged the heel that slammed down where she’d just been stood seconds ago but Rin swept her leg out, slamming her shin and kicking Sana’s legs out from under her. Was it wrong to enjoy the heavy thud of her body slamming into the floor? 

_ Probably _ but this was revenge for making her literally  _ bite _ someone. 

With flexibility that Rin could only envy, Sana jumped back to her feet with the elegance of flowing water. Her lip curling into a snarl, they were both vicious and they were both pissed off, there wasn’t any prettiness in her movements, she wasn’t shy or subtle. Most of the time, Rin was a bull in a china shop, it was her way or no way. Which was why when the girl gained her balance, Rin knocked back with a clothesline to the neck. 

Sana laid there, coughing and wheezing, clutching her neck. 

Rin rolled her over so that she was on her back, taking a single kunai from her holster and pointing it between her eyes. 

“I thought you were gonna make this interesting?” Rin whispered. 

( _ Please stop, pleasepleaseplease! It’s just a spar, it’s just a little girl, we’re better than this, she’s only a child! _ )

( _ So was I, _ Rin reminded the echo.)

Rin wasn’t going to be dismissed, maybe this was the only way for them to acknowledge for now. 

Sana’s eyes widened and there was a flicker of fear. 

“Alright, y’little shits, break it up,” the teacher announced and Rin fought the urge to jump at his booming voice. 

Her shoulder dipping with the weight of his hand on her shoulder. 

“Let her up.”

It wasn’t a request. 

Rin slid the kunai back into her holster and the red haze seemed to fade, temper settling as the two of them stood in the centre of the ring. 

“Reconciliation seal.”

Rin held out her hand with only a moment's hesitation and Sana stared at it for a second. 

“Y’did okay, Nohara,” Sana eventually said, completing the seal with a wide grin. 

“You weren’t too bad either,” Rin shrugged with a smile. 

And that was that, everything seemed to continue as per usual. Nue giving her a small smile from across the way, a thumbs-up of approval. 

Obito refused to meet her eyes. 

She didn’t think much of it until they were walking, out of the Academy but on the outskirts, far enough that Obito wouldn’t be spotted by too many Clan members or at least, ones that cared enough to tattle on him fraternising with her. 

“Rin?”

“Hm?”

“Today… with sparring?” Obito murmured, looking a little unsettled. “You… _ you  _ were kinda scary.”

Rin blinked. 

“Thank you.”

Obito spluttered, flushing from the back of his neck to his ears as he waved his arms, wafting them as if they’d make his point for him. “I didn’t mean it-! It wasn’t a  _ compliment _ !” Oh _ , oh _ . He was actually being serious? Rin’s expression fell into a mask she hadn’t felt the need to wear around Obito for a long time and he seemed to realise how it sounded, his own expression shuttering, like blinds closing. “That’s not… you, you were really intense today and that kinda freaked me out.”

“Sensei said there weren’t any rules.”

“That doesn’t matter!” Obito exploded, his closed-off expression suddenly come to life and he was  _ angry _ . “You never attack a comrade like that! Doesn’t matter if it’s a spar, they’re gonna be a Konoha Shinobi too!”

Rin reeled back at his outburst, physically jumping back from him. 

He’s breathing heavy and he’s tearing up but neither of them mentions it. She’s too shocked about his yelling and he seemed to, he seemed to be watching her in  _ disgust _ . And that, that made her stomach roll more than anything. The echo didn’t need to chime in for this because of Obito’s gaze, the way he was looking at her? It was painful enough. 

Like he didn’t know her. Like he didn’t recognise who was in front of him. 

“I gave back as much as she gave me,” Rin whispered. 

Did he not see her choking? Her  _ struggling to  _ **_breathe?_ **

“She’s an Inuzuka, they’re supposed to act like that- you’re-  _ you’re- _ ”

“A civilian?” It was toneless and blunt and seemed to shake Obito out of this angry haze. “An orphan? Not from a Clan? Go on, I’m supposed to-  _ what _ ?”

“I didn’t mean it-”

“You don’t seem to mean a lotta things, Obito,” now they were both snapping at each other. “Just because I’m not from a family like yours or hers, I’m supposed to be weaker? I’m- I’m- I’m supposed to lay down and let her  _ beat me? _ ”

“Stop putting words in my mouth!”

“They were already there, on the tip of your tongue!”

Obito threw his arms up, letting out a short yell of frustration, he looked close to ripping out clumps of his own hair. Rin felt her own hackles rise. 

( _ The echo’s clawing at her chest, it’s demanding her to stand down. _ )

“Look, Obito, I don’t know what your Clan taught you,” Rin eventually said after they both took a second to  _ breathe _ . To not let their tempers consume them, Nue’s light footsteps echoing as she ran to catch up with them, her eyes darting between her two friends,  _ clearly _ having missed the sparks of their argument. “But you learn pretty quickly where we’re from that you do whatever you can to win, to survive.”

Nue made it clear she wasn’t taking part of the conversation when Obito’s beseeching stare turned on her; she held her hands up in surrender and took a firm step away from them. 

“But it’s not  _ like  _ that anymore,” Obito insisted. 

“We’ll always be treated a little different because of where we came from, always have to work a little harder and do things better just to get the same recognition as people from Clan’s,” she shrugged. 

It was the way their world worked. 

“That’s not fair though!” 

“Life’s not fair.”

“Well,  _ fine! _ I’m gonna make it better then,” he huffed. 

“Oh yeah?” There was a drop of dread in her stomach and the echo  _ stung _ . “How?”

“...I’ll figure something out.”

* * *

“Okay, so,  _ clearly, _ the spars were a terrible idea,” Naoko-sensei said, her eyes flicking over to her colleague who grinned, unashamed as he knocked back his sake. There wasn’t any room for him to disagree, it was a statement, a fact. 

The sky was blue, the grass was green, the spars ended up with two of them in the hospital afterwards and three letters of complaint. 

_ They were on the brink of war, what did these parents expect? _

Naoko simply gestured for the bar staff to leave the bottle at their table, knocking back and finishing her own glass. Flipping it so that the glass laid upside down on the table, she considered making a pyramid out of them but it was probably in poor taste. 

More often than not, the teachers ended up at the bar after the Academy finished. 

The brats were stressful. 

“It was pretty fun, y’gotta admit,” Sota laughed. “Some performed better than expected.”

“Hm, yes, but, whilst I asked you to oversee their spars whilst I covered for Aburame-san, I didn’t expect you to drop them in it right away,” her class was small in size by comparison to her other classes over the years but they had potential. She hadn’t been soft with them and they’d met her challenges head on most of the time. There were few in the class which she could see falling behind. She looked over at the man. “Did you at least have them stretch before sparring?”

“They won’t get chance to stretch before battle.”

“So that’s a no.”

“That’s a  _ fuck no _ .”

Naoko scoffed. 

“The Uchiha’s performed as well as they could, Obito lagged behind but he made a pretty good attempt before Ibiki body slammed him into submission,” Sota informed her gleefully, like a child recalling their favourite moments from a tv show. 

She could feel a headache already brewing.

“What about the placements?” 

“Performed well, Nue won her match with Ginjiro,” both of them rolling their eyes at the riotous boy who was known to interrupt and disturb their classes. “Rin won her match against Sana. Taro lost to Genma and Kyosuke was the odd number so Gai offered to spar with him.”

“And he didn’t take Gai up on that?”

“Well, have you seen him in a taijutsu match?”

“Fucking little monster,” Naoko murmured fondly, she’d been good friends with Dai. Like father, like son. 

“Yeah well, Nohara was no better.”   


“Rin?” 

“Bit the Inuzuka girl to get her off her,” Sota was grinning from ear to ear at this and Naoko couldn’t help but groan, dropping her head into her hands. Her glasses upturned and Sota gleefully poured her a drink as she bemoaned her luck. “You’ve got a right class of little monsters.”

“You’re terrible, why do I put up with you?”

“Probably because I’m great in bed,” was all she got in return. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're now up to date with where I was on FF.net, so now I can write some more! Thank you guys so much for your comments and kudos and everything!


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not every argument can be brushed over and forgotten about. Sometimes you just needed a day or two to be bitter and petty.

Nohara Rin was an orphan. 

It was something she was reminded of as soon as her eyes opening in the morning. When her eyes flickered open and the sun glared down through the curtains of her shared room. The bedding she was laid in scratched against her skin but her bed wouldn’t ever be considered her own, the pyjamas she wore were threadbare. 

It was a reminder she was wrapped inside before she even opened her eyes. 

_ “She’s an Inuzuka, they’re supposed to act like that- you’re- you’re- ” _

Rin closed her eyes.

The spars yesterday brought on a whole new can of worms. 

She wouldn’t lay there and pretend that they could brush over their small argument, that Rin would be fine and forget it all because then they could go back to how they usually were. Sure,  _ she could lie _ . That was no different than pretending that she was  _ great _ , that there wasn’t a small hole a betrayal carved out of her chest because of his naive words… how could he  _ possibly _ know after all?

_ He didn’t know what it was like to have nothing _ . 

_ He didn’t know the effect of his words when she hadn’t said anything at all. _

She might’ve argued with him, she yelled and she’d ranted and she’d huffed  _ puffed _ -

Rin hadn’t explained why she was upset though. 

She hadn’t told him why she couldn’t look him in the eye,  _ couldn’t not wouldn’t _ , after their little confrontation because even when he’d waved goodbye, she’d turned away so she didn’t have to look at him when she walked away. She settled for waving over her shoulder whilst Nue said her own goodbyes because Nue hadn’t heard that part of the conversation.

Nue hadn’t heard how Obito had tried to explain the difference between expectations of  _ clan children _ and those of their stature-  _ of their placement _ . 

The bed, as scratchy and lumpy as it was, was her safe place. 

Rin just wanted to wrap herself in the safety of her blankets, to stay there all day if she could.

She wasn’t someone who ran away from her problems, not often at least. Certain things were too important to run away from, were more important than that large swell of dread in the pit of her stomach, this  _ need _ to avoid Obito at all costs. 

Her education was important, her grades at the Academy because if she slipped-  _ and all it took was one slip _ , before it was a chain reaction, an avalanche. One slip and she was out on her ass. 

The chill nipped at her as she ripped the covers away, pulling on her clothes for the day. The seams cried out as she pulled on her shirt with a lot more vigour than was required, as if the steady and mundane action could distract her from what was weighing her down. 

There was a knock at the door. 

_ It was probably Nue _ , it was always Nue. 

Her roommate groaned, cursing under her breath as she flipped over, using her pillow to muffle out the sound and the sunlight. Rin watched her in envy because she didn’t have to get up for another two hours, which was when her shift at the bakery started. 

Rin didn’t open the door because they had no privacy really, Nue just had exceptional manners. 

She was already dressed, her hair pulled back into a perfect bun and her lips were pursed as she leaned on the door jamb. As f she expected better whenever she walked into the room and usually Rin was pretty punctual. Her self-pity and dread allowed her to stay in bed a little longer than what she’d originally planned though. 

“You ready?”

She rolled her eyes but she didn’t say anything, Rin knew that if she did that she’d probably snap and take her bad mood out on her friend,  _ and Nue didn’t deserve that _ .

Instead, she hiked her leg up on her bed and buckled her weapon holster around her thigh. There were muscles there that didn’t exist almost a year or so prior, they were leaner and firmer than when they started the Academy. The click of the buckle was sharp, against her roommates steady and sleep-riddled breaths, against Nue’s expectant gaze. She felt like she was unerwater,  _ something was wrong _ , everything was echoed  _ cloudy _ and hazy. Like she wasn’t really there anymore, tied to a walking mass of  _ flesh sinew muscle bone _ -

“Hey.”

Rin looked up.

She hadn’t realised she’d been staring at her boots without moving, she’d finished buckling her holster and her hands laid flat against her thigh. They were cold. Nue was watching, as always, her pale eyes were always a little unnerving but they were concerned and expressive.  _ There was a tick in her expression _ like it was struggling to match what was painted in her gaze.

“You okay?”

“Not really,” there was no point lying, why bother? 

Nue bit her lip. 

“Are you worried about today?”

“ ‘Bout what?”

“ The spars? Obito?” They were the top contenders and Nue didn’t have to be a genius,  _ to be a Clan child _ , to realise which one was causing the itch beneath her flesh. “Is this about the argument yesterday? I thought you guys made up.”

“We didn’t say sorry and we didn’t really see eye-to-eye,”  _ she had nothing to be sorry for! _

“You’re gonna have to talk o him.”

“I don’t  _ have _ to.”

( _ Yes you do, yesyoudo _ **_yesyoudo-_ ** _ ) _

Nue didn’t say anything and Rin shrugged this fugue state off, pulling her leg from her bed and tying her sash around her waist. 

They were silent as they left, most of the children were still asleep but some were pottering around for their early jobs or the classes which started soon for the younger bunch. Nue stopping every now and then to say her goodbyes to someone on their way because now she was an Academy Student. She had  _ potential.  _

She could  _ be someone _ and there wasn’t a person in that building, in their ‘ _ home _ ’ who wouldn’t capitalise on that. 

“So is that it then?” Nue asked as they strolled towards the Academy, the path and route are well-trekked. Something their feet followed automatically. 

“Is what it then?”

“Are you just not gonna speak to him ever again?”

_ (The echo buzzed, angry and threatening just against her ribs. _ )

“...When you say it like that, it sounds stupid.” Rin griped. 

She shoved her hands in her pockets to hide the way her fingers curled into fists because punching something was easier than having to express her frustration and her hurt and the wound which Obito had unknowingly ripped at with his callous words. If anyone would understand it was Nue but at the same time, the words got caught in her throat when she thought about explaining herself. Lodged in her jugular and she threatened to choke on them. 

“I’m not gonna apologise,” she insisted instead. 

“D’you think he’ll apologise?” Nue doesn’t question whether or not the apology is deserved or necessary, all she knows is that it’s something Rin feels strongly about. Something she doesn’t understand completely so she can’t make that kind of distinction. 

“I.. don’t know, I think he probably thinks we’re okay.”

“Are you gonna tell him otherwise?”

The Academy’s in view, looming like a deadline. 

“Not today.”

Because today was bad enough. 

Today their spars would be assessed, they were given a half day with an appointment time in the afternoon. They were one-on-one with the teachers so they could discuss what went well and what they needed to improve in. It was better than having to do it in front of the whole class she supposed. 

They usually took the second row from the front in class but with her mood, Rin was more than happy to slide in on the back row. Obito would stroll in late but he’d have to take the seat by Nue, the one furthest away from Rin. 

_ She’d buy Nue something nice for her sacrifice _ . 

Obito did eventually turn up but Naoko-sensei turned a blind eye to his flushed face, it happened too often and it just consumed time trying to berate him for it. She stilled ever so slightly when the other children giggled, shooting their class a warning glare as he collapsed into his empty seat. Which was probably for the best since they wouldn’t really have a chance to talk during class. 

Mostly out of fear of their sensei. 

It was one thing to be late but another to be called upon for talking during class as well. 

Avoidance thy name was Rin, she sped off before lunch, claiming errands which she didn’t have and Nue just went along with it because she was honestly the best. Maybe Obito was sad about it or suspicious but she didn’t stick around long enough to find out, her appointment was a little later tan most of her classes but she didn’t want to linger. 

Wandering around the shops and looking, it got boring after a while but she managed to kill a few hours up until she had to trek back to the Academy for her appointment. Making sure to avoid her friends at all costs. 

Sana was leaving just as she was coming in. 

“Good luck in there, Nohara,” the Inuzuka offered with a grin, offering her fist out which Rin tapped with her own. 

_ No hard feelings _ . 

“Thanks, did it go okay?”

Sana waved her hand in a so-so fashion. 

“Eh, how it always is.”

Rin waved her off and headed towards her classroom, knocking quietly as she reached the door rather than lingering outside nervously like she wanted to. 

Naoko-sensei glanced up from the papers she was marking. 

“Rin, thank you for being on time,” there was a distinct edge to her voice and from the way which Sota-sensei rolled his eyes, she had a feeling that he hadn’t exactly been punctual for the meetings. “Take a seat.”

She did as she was told and tried not to squirm underneath their combined gazes. 

“So, the spars,” Sota-sensei drawled, grinning from ear-to-ear. 

Naoko-sensei looked less enthused. 

“You used more force than what you should’ve with a fellow Konoha shinobi,” she reprimanded with pursed lips and it was mixed signals if Rin was ever sent them, one sensei grinning at her with obvious pride whilst the other disciplining her for the very same act.  _ Very confusing _ . “Sana has received the same feedback, both of you were too heavy handed. Then again, if the  _ proper rules _ had been in place-”

“Oh shove it,” the man grumbled, sneering at her. 

“Other than that, you performed admirably. Showed varied skills, you kept your head in a difficult situation,” Naoko-sensei eventually cracked a small smile as she read her points off of the sheet in front of her. “It looks promising. There’s room for improvement, your flexibility and speed needs a lot of work, not to mention developing an individual style rather than the Academy taught, but there’s time for that.”

“Did it feel good to beat the snot out of her?” Sota-sensei interrupted. 

“...What?”

“You heard me,” he insisted, ignoring his colleague's exasperated sigh. “You looked right at home in that fight, my guess is it’s not your first.”

“...It’s not,” fights were pretty common in the orphanage. 

“ _ Apart from that _ ,” her other teacher cut in, seeming eager to get their meeting back onto plan. “Is there anything you’re particularly struggling with or are looking to specialise in?”

“I’d like to do some more chakra exercises,” her grasp of it wasn’t 100%, it was like… there was just some fluctuations. Like for a few seconds at a time, her chakra wasn’t her own. It happened a couple of times whilst she was trying to do a few jutsus and genjutsus, it hadn’t hindered her but it wasn’t exactly  _ great  _ either. 

Naoko-sensei made a note of it. 

“There’s no point in drawing this out for too long, so that’s it for now, if any issues come up or you’d like to discuss anything with us further, don’t be a stranger.”

Rushed, simple but down to the point. Rin knew a dismissal when she heard one. 

The sun had begun to set when she came out, not that she’d been in there for long but it was still enough that the skies had slowly started to turn orange and the air began to cool. Rin was one of the last appointments of the day after all. 

She nodded at the next student who was making their way in,  _ not that she could remember their name _ , before setting off for the short walk back to the orphanage. Nue no doubt waiting for her to get back so she could either, go through what was said at the meeting or talk about her current issue with Obito. 

Rin wasn’t really up for talking though.

So maybe she took the long way back, it wasn’t any different than how she’d spent her entire day. Just… actively avoiding everyone, refusing to make herself feel better by actually discussing what was bothering her. Sometimes she didn’t  _ want _ to feel better, she wanted to sit and stew about what was bothering her. 

( _ Please! Please just talk to someone- anyone! _ )

“Rin?”

She looked up, trying not to grimace when Minato put a hand on her shoulder. 

“Hi.”

“Hey kid,” he crouched down ever so slightly, still way too tall for his own good and she was still… a little on the short side, to say the least. “You okay?”

She considered her options, remembering his offer a couple of days ago. 

( _ Go for it! You need  _ **_someone_ ** _ to talk to. _ )

(Rin quietly caved under the echos concerns.)

“You said something about dinner?” Rin asked quietly. 

Now, she was aware of the fact that besides the few  _ brief _ conversations they’d had, they were close to strangers. Sure, he’d sponsored her application and in turn, she owed him an insurmountable debt, one she doubted he realised that she owed him. Other than that though, they weren’t friends and they were barely acquaintances really. 

That didn’t stop him from smiling though and Rin brutally crushed the warm  _ glow _ which the echo emitted in the back of her mind. 

“Sure.”

He motioned for her to follow but it only drew her attention to the fact that his student was nowhere in sight, something she questioned with a beseeching glance at his empty wings. 

Minato chuckled, scratching his cheek with a somewhat guilty expression. 

“Kakashi is... Kakashi is currently undergoing some-  _ ahem _ , alternative training,” he coughed, looking away from her and Rin guessed that she really  _ didn’t _ want to know the story behind the entire thing, instead, settling for matching his pace and following him home. 

She tried not to think about how she felt like a stray dog

Rin focused on her footsteps and following him up the stairs, trying to keep up with his long legs as he took them three at a time- with every flight, he seemed to get more and more excited. She could see it with the way his smile grew, into something more relaxed and relieved, like the stress was peeling off his shoulders. 

He lived on the top floor of the building and the door was decidedly scuffed, still, despite living there,  _ he knocked _ . 

Kushina was decidedly amused. 

She wanted to be annoyed because Minato was late,  _ again _ , something which was becoming commonplace with the more responsibilities he was receiving. Instead, he turned up with a little girl,  _ not a girl,  _ a kunoichi, one who looked half wild and half dead, in her eyes at least. It gave her pause as she opened her front door, blood boiling and ready to chew him out for making her wait, didn’t he know it was ramen night? 

“Kushina, this is Rin, the girl I told you about, the sponsorship?” 

She was like Kakashi in a way. 

Her hackles were already up by her ears, eyes wide and she looked ready to snap at the hand which Kushina offered for her to shake. Untrusting and completely alone in a way which not a lot of people understood. 

She was loud and she was proud, sometimes not the smartest but Kushina saw what a lot of people ignored. Willfully or obliviously. She’d been dragged across Fire country, away from a home that was now just smouldering remains, with no family to speak of other than the one she was forging for herself. 

Maybe once upon a time, she looked like Rin. 

“Yeah he mentioned yo a bit,” she walked into their home and expected them to walk in behind her, Minato’s hand firmly planted between her shoulder blades so Rin couldn’t change her mind and run away. “You stayin’ for dinner?”

_ Her only chance of escape-! _

“She is.”

( _ The echo laughed and laughed and laughed. _ )

“Good, y’look like you could use some meat on your bones,” the woman was tall with red hair and Rin decided she was crazy. The wild kind of crazy, like a civilian with no chakra trying to climb walls handless. Like Matron Saeko on one of her better days. “Come, sit,  _ sit! _ ”

Minato was like a bouncer, behind her every step of the way so she couldn’t run for it,  _ why did she think this was a good idea? _

“Thank you,” Rin offered uselessly, feeling out of place in their home. 

It was cluttered with things from both of them, sealing scrolls and spilt ink, a vest thrown haphazardly over the back of an armchair. Rin was pretty sure she spotted a frog shaped pillow somewhere amongst the many  _ many  _ cushions on the chairs. 

“What kinda ramen d’you want? Teuchi’s great and I’m his number one customer,” Kushina explained with a wide grin, a touch of drool at the corner of her mouth just at the thought. 

“I don’t have enough for ramen.”

Rin flinched when Minato tapped her head in reprimand, “Was that what she asked?”

She felt  _ sorry  _ for Hatake having to put up with the two of them. 

“Beef please,” it was better to just go along with their demands, for now, was this Stockholm syndrome? They’d touched upon it in the Academy. 

“So, Rin, how’ve things been?” It’s awkward and it’s small-talk, two of her least favourite things. 

“Been better,” she admitted, Minato nodding sagely as if he understood without hearing her entire life story. “Uh… you?”

“The idiot’s either been training Kakashi every other day, paperwork or seals, he’s  _ boring _ ,” Kushina answered for him when he opened his mouth, grinning as she walked past him, ruffling his hair as she went. Rin couldn’t help but smile at their antics, they seemed  _ normal _ in a way. Obviously, they were  **completely** insane but in a good way, like  _ Gai _ . 

“I don’t do paperwork  _ all the time _ ,” Minato protested. 

“Sure.”

“I don’t!”

“Then what’s that pile there?” Rin asked, the stack of papers almost reached her waist and there were multicoloured sticky notes hanging out, all reading different signs labelled of varied importance. 

Minato visibly deflated. 

“...Paperwork.”

Kushina cackled from in the kitchen. 

“Why is it, whenever I bring someone ‘round, you always gang up on me with them?” Minato demanded to his girlfriend,  _ well _ , Rin assumed they were dating. 

“Somebody needs to make sure your head doesn’t get too big.”

“This hair wouldn’t work with a small head.”

“Yeah,” Rin deadpanned, looking at the mess of blonde hair. “ _ That’s it _ .”

“God, imagine her and Kakashi in a room together,” Kushina murmured as she shrugged on her coat, probably to go and get the ramen she was going on about a few minutes ago. “Your ego would be shattered in  _ minutes _ .”

“I wouldn’t say  _ minutes _ ,” Rin protested, she wasn’t  _ that  _ bad. “Maybe just under an hour.”

Kushina sniggered, reaching over to ruffle Rin’s hair, not noticing how the girl stiffened and froze under the touch before she was already out the door. 

“Don’t encourage her bullying,” Minato huffed without any heat behind his words. 

“Don’t be easy to bully,” Rin didn’t realise how she’d relaxed, despite that moment of fear when she felt the fingers in her hair, the snappy retorts had made her loosen up but it was obvious that Minato had. The corner of his mouth pulling up as he watched her slowly circle his living room, looking high and low, just curious about everything that made their home. “You sure you’re okay Rin?”

“I got into a fight with a friend,” she said though it was hard to hear, her mouth barely moving. 

“Which one?” The purple-haired girl or the Uchiha?

“Obito.”  _ Ah _ , Uchiha. 

“Hm, big fight?” Minato asked, making sure to sound relatively disinterested. Something he found worked best with Kakashi because as soon as he showed investment in something which he was slowly opening up about, it was like he snapped shut. A closed book once again. 

“Maybe.”

“You talking at least?”

“I’m… not talking to him.”

“So he’s talking to you?”

“I dunno, been avoiding him all day.”

“Riiiiiight,” Minato could see that communication was  _ not _ her strong point. How did he seem to attract these kinds of kids? He didn’t really comment on it further as his girlfriend burst back into their home, she’d only been gone a couple of minutes but he also knew that if there was one thing Kushina hated, it was cold ramen. 

The dishes were served in record time and they were all curled up on the chairs in the living room. Kushina sprawled out on the couch, leaving Minato to take the floor, his legs under the kotatsu. Rin curled up in the armchair, taking up barely any room, enjoying her ramen at a steady pace. 

_ Unlike some people _ . 

“So what’s the problem kid?” Kushina eventually asked, eyes narrow and shrewd as she inhaled her third bowl of ramen. Jabbing her chopsticks in the younger girls direction with conviction. “I know that look, that’s ‘ _ a boy did something so dumb he doesn’t even know what he’s done look _ ’.”

“You can tell that just from a look?”

“Sure,” the woman shrugged. “I wore it a lot when I started dating this lump.”

Said lump rolled his eyes. 

“Okay,  _ so _ , we had spars the other week and… Obito, he didn’t think I fought as I should,” she was paraphrasing here. “He said that I shouldn’t have fought another Konoha nin like I did and that how she fought,  _ which was just as bad as me _ , was expected because she was an Inuzuka.”

“Oh,” Minato murmured, wincing as he ate. “Ouch. Not good.”

Rin flung her hands up as if to say  _ thank you! _

“He just… doesn’t get it,” Rin moped. “I mean, he knows that Clan’s aren’t great, he told me apparently he and his grandmother aren’t exactly…  _ included _ all the time. I’m pretty sure his cousins are bullying him as well, but…”

“He won’t get it,” Minato shrugged and there was no sugar coating his words, something she always appreciated about him. “He might not always be on good terms with his Clan but he’ll always have the prestige of that name and the perks it comes with, whether he realises it or not.”

“I think you need to explain to him why it made you so upset,” Kushina chipped in, having emptied her bowl and got up; insistent on making them all a cup of tea.

“Will explaining it do any good?”

“It’s better than you blowing up at him and not giving him a reason as to why,” which is exactly what she had done,  _ in a way _ . 

“I just.. I thought he’d be different, y’know?” 

Kushina placed the drink in front of her, flopping down into the armchair alongside Rin and the girl squirmed at the sudden invasion of personal space. They wriggled around until they were settled, Minato watching with a small smirk as Kushina wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “When I first met Mikoto, she didn’t give me the time of day- thought I was an annoyance and thought her time was better spent with other people.”

“Uchiha Mikoto?”  _ The nice lady Obito always went on and on about? _

“The very same,” Kushina said it all with a fond smile, probably recalling the very memories. “The thing is, she was told and raised to believe that being in a Clan is the be all and end all… now, Obito knows Clan’s aren’t perfect and that’s half the battle. He’s gotta realise the rest on his own, it's not on your shoulders to fix him or his perception.”

“Even if I want to? Even if he’s my friend?”

“If he’s a real friend then he’ll work it out, he’ll make the effort,” Kushina reassured her, ruffling her hair in the same way she did earlier but this time, Rin didn't stiffen up as much as she had. Sure, her shoulders tensed but she leaned into the touch ever so slightly. 

“...I guess,” she muttered reluctantly, sipping her cooling tea and gagging at the bitterness. “Can I have some  sugar?”

“Sure thing, kiddo.”

* * *

“Hey.”

Obito looked slightly startled to find Rin at his doorstep, he hadn’t invited either of them over as of yet and he had the feeling,  _ it was more like a slap in the face _ , that Rin had been avoiding him. 

“Uh,” he glanced over his shoulder worriedly. 

“Look, I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting but,” Rin shrugged. “I kinda wanna explain it, if that’s okay w’you?”

“ _ Obito! _ ”

Rin glanced over his shoulder, the corner of her mouth curling at the older woman which hobbled into the room. Ancient looking but fierce, there were thick lines framing her face and scars plastered across her flesh, silvery with age. 

“Who’s at the door?” She griped with a fierce scowl as she got closer, Rin felt akin to a cockroach underneath her boot. 

“A… a friend from the Academy, obaa-san,” Obito said quietly, blushing ever so slightly at the surprised look the woman gave him. 

“A friend, huh?” Honestly, the woman could’ve worked in T&I, her gaze was like a laser, like a microscope and Rin was her new specimen. “You gonna invite her in?”

“Yeah  _ Obito _ ,” she drawled. “Y’gonna invite me in?”

“Not if you’re gonna gang up on me,” he said flatly but there was a small smile tugging at his lips. 

“No promises.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not like this chapter, I do not like green eggs and ham, Sam I am. No seriously, this was a ball ache because I love Obito, he's so sweet but somewhat naive. So we have Rin being a little petty, a little angsty because when didn't you have those kinda days as a kid? Also, can I just say that I love writing Kushina? I didn't have her written in until later but, WOOP! There she is!


End file.
